A/N: Happy fall y’all! Still a little stuck on this story - trying to get where I’m at to where I want it to be is proving to be a royal jackass pain, I swear. But, here is another chapter and I hate to end it the way I did, but, oh well! Chapter 9 is in the works!
Reminder: I ain’t ever seen Pedro Pascal in FUCK ALL, I’m just coming up with this as I go along, using imdb.com, wiki, and 84,000 tabs I got open to plan out this shit. I also write soft versions of his characters so if you’re craving asshole vibes, I ain’t got any but my own to offer.
Part 8 –Fate is not the Answer, it is Merely the Key
“Welcome back, agent!” Marquetta’s voice rang across the lobby in welcome and as Pike ambled over to the welcome desk, he was awashed with the same sensation that he had the day before – a sense of coming home. For all the places he lived and worked in his career, nowhere had ever felt like this before. Strange.
“What can we do for you today?” The young woman’s voice cut through his thoughts and he felt a little chagrined to be caught daydreaming on the job. He straightened his shoulders and flashed a smile at her. It took everything in Marquetta to not swoon on the spot. Lord was he a handsome man.
“I’m sorry to come by unannounced, it’s becoming a bad habit. But I need a few things from Ms. Carter that I forgot to retrieve yesterday. Is she around?”
“She is, why don’t you go on up. She was in her office last time I called up and that was about, oh… ten minutes ago.”
“Thanks!” Marcus waved at her as he walked towards the stairs and he could feel the woman’s stare burning a hole through the seat of his pants and he couldn’t help but smile. She was not subtle at all and it did stoke his ego a bit, but all it did was amuse him rather than push him to ask her out like it would have in the past. Strange.
-*-
Rosemary never liked complete silence, something about it unnerved her and she became known for playing music wherever she was. The rest of the staff had gotten used to it, not blinking an eye if she was one day playing sea shanties while pulling items from the vaults for research or hearing AC/DC float out of her office while she pounded out grant narratives.
In the aftermath of the break-in, she chose to work in silence. It was a non-verbal way of blaming herself for what had happened - deep down she believed that if she hadn’t played music, she probably would have heard her attackers coming. Helen eventually said something in passing about the lack of music and within days, the director smiled to herself when the strains of Heart were heard coming from Rosemary’s office.
The swinging sounds of the Andrews Sisters filled the workroom as Rosemary worked on repairing the Austrian crystal damaged during the attack. Despite their destruction of the workroom, very few pieces had been outright damaged, with the crystal taking the brunt of it. She avoided the repair job over the last few weeks, not wanting to see such a visual reminder of her assault. But something Amy had mentioned in passing made her think that if she repaired the glass, then maybe something that had broken inside of her would be fixed, too.
Carefully, she wrapped a piece of painter’s tape to hold in place the piece she just glued, smoothing down the edges. As she sat back to view her handy work, a strong knock came at the door. Everything in Rosemary paused, blood suddenly roaring in her ears. She whipped around and her guest could see the barely disguised panic on her face.
Pike stopped immediately, raising his hands, and murmuring that it was just him. Not realizing she was breathing heavily, Rosemary continued to grip the workbench edge as the panic cascaded over her. The agent remained calm, using a low tone as he voiced his apologies while slowly stepping towards her. When she felt his warm palm on her shoulder and the other on her wrist, she finally took a deep breath and looked into his eyes.
How kind they are, she thought. And that feeling from yesterday – the one of safety – washed over her, leaving no room for the panic to grip her tight. Her body began to relax, and she started to breathe normally again. He could tell when she was coming back to him and he gently smiled and nodded. She let out a shaky breath and nodded back, forcing a small smile on her face. A small voice in her head said she should be embarrassed for reacting that way, but the sheer kindness and understanding she saw on his face shut out such negativity.
“Agent Pike! Back so soon?” She tried to add some lightness to her voice that she didn’t really feel. He bowed his head with a small smile, his hands still on her body while his thumbs rubbing small circles of comfort into her skin.
“Yes, I’m sorry. I really should have called ahead of time. I didn’t mean to scare you.” He sighed and shook his head as he silently berated himself. He should have known better.
“No, don’t apologize, you didn’t know.” She tried to continue, but his hand gently tightened on her wrist and she stopped.
“I do. You’ve been through enough without me stirring up painful memories for you. Hurting you is the last thing I’d want to do.” They stared at each other for a beat before she nodded, and her smile finally reached her eyes.
“Okay. What can I help you with?” He smiled in relief.
“I wanted to get copies of your files on The Cornucopia so we could flesh out our case. Would that be possible?”
“Absolutely. Follow me.” Rosemary moved to get up and Pike moved back, already missing the heat of her skin under his palms. He clutched them into a quick fist before relaxing them as the pleasure of touching her skittered through his body. He hoped she didn’t notice as he turned to follow her, his long legs keeping perfect stride with hers as they walked towards her office.
“Question Agent Pike.” She slowed down and waved him into her office. He bowed his head as he walked past her. Banana sat up on the couch, his tail wagging quickly at the sight of his new friend and both laughed. Pike bent over to give the dog a friendly scratch behind the ears as he responded.
“Go ahead.”
“Since our records are now wrong, can I get a copy of the piece’s history so I can have the most updated version? I’d like for it to be as correct as possible.”
“Sure, I understand.”
“Great!” Rosemary smiled at him again as she walked around her desk to her filing cabinet, pulling open a drawer and shifting through the files. As she thumbed through them, Pike placed his briefcase on her desk, watching her out of the corner of his eye. While most of the panic had left, he could still see tenseness in her shoulders that wasn’t there before. He internally sighed, mad at himself for being so stupid.
When she withdrew the correct file, she began pulling off paperclips so it could be fed through the copier faster. When she looked towards him, she noticed the file in his hand, and she reached out to take it. Rosemary wasn’t expecting it to be so heavy and she bungled a bit before the file folder slipped from her hands and everything spilled out onto her desk. A high pitched ‘oh shit’ left her mouth before she realized it and immediately began to clean up the mess she made.
As she fumbled with the papers, Pike leaned to help her, feeling his ears grow warm with each brush of her fingers against his. He cleared his throat as he assembled the case report back in order, shuffling the papers to hide his attraction to her. She had been focused on cleaning up the case photos when she suddenly stopped, standing stock still.
The agent noted her change and realize the tenseness he observed before was still there, but it felt different as she stared intently at a photo in her hand. He dropped his head to try and look her in the eye when he asked her if anything was wrong. When she looked at him, his breath stuttered in chest – her eyes were sparkling in excitement, something he had yet to see from her and the sheer joy of that look rendered him mute.
“Agent Pike, does that report say anything about who rescued the statue in 1946?” Her voice seemed to vibrate with excitement, and he could feel it seep into his bones as he shook his head no. “Okay, do you believe in fate, the universe, coincidences? Any of that?”
“Sometimes, I suppose. Why do you ask?”
With glee, Rosemary flipped around the photo she had been looking at, a modern scan of a black and white image. The glossiness made it hard to see, but when she angled her wrist, he realized it was a photo of the Monument Men team that had recovered The Cornucopia and the other pieces stolen from the Luxembourg ducal family. But he was confused still, the feeling clearly etched on his face and she giggled. Actually giggled.
“My dear agent,” She pointed to a tall man with a hauntingly familiar smile on his face that stood out against his shorter, more sober-faced fellow soldiers. “meet George Carter, US Army Captain and an original member of the Monument Men team during the War. That’s my grandfather holding The Cornucopia.”
Pike’s eyes shot up to look at Rosemary and she laughed again. He turned to glance at her wall, realizing he had been looking at a picture of the same man yesterday. The photo was almost similar, except George stood next to a large painting. He wondered if they were from around the same time or if one was older than the other. He turned back to Rosemary.
“I don’t know what this means exactly, but it looks like when it comes to rescuing The Cornucopia, the Carters have this handled.”
“Meaning what exactly?”
“Meaning that I firmly believe you’ll find the piece and bring it home. Wherever that may be.”
“You do?”
“I do.”
—***—
Three weeks later
The chill of the blustery November day was seeping into Rosemary’s bones and she shivered as she trudged up to the backdoor of the house. Her fingers fumbled with the key to unlock the house and when the door finally swung open, she stumbled backwards as Banana rushed through the house to his bed near the heat register in the living room.
“Thank you, my ever-loving companion!” She called out to the dog as she took off her coat and scarf. The Home was toasty, but the chill of the kitchen tile still crept though her socks as she toed off her shoes. Padding over to the fridge, she pulled out some milk for her favorite hot cocoa and before she could pull out the saucepan, her phone began to ring. Noting it was Fern’s ringtone, she immediately answered it.
“Hey Ferny Fern, what’s up?”
“I got great news! The probate cleared today!”
“What?! So soon?” Rosemary set the milk jug on the counter and began to dance through the kitchen in joy.
“I know, I wasn’t expecting to be so quick, but I was told everything was in such neat order that it was quote one of the easiest probates I’ve cleared unquote.”
“So, does this mean what I think it means?”
“It means you’re free and clear just to live your life and run your new business.” Fern’s smile was evident through the phone as much as Rosemary’s heavy breath from her celebratory dance party.
“Okay, I’m going to celebrate. What are you doing tonight?”
“Winston is back in town from that conference he went to, so we’re having dinner.”
“Sure, who’s on the menu first, you or him?” There was no hiding the cheeky grin in Rosemary’s voice as she poured milk into the saucepan and turned up the heat.
“Quiet.” Fern huffed over phone. “Lunch on Saturday instead?”
“Maybe dinner, let’s see what Amy and Tina think.”
The two women chatted a little longer before hanging up and Rosemary grinned at nothing as her milk began to heat up. What a weight off her shoulders.
—***—
“Rosemary!” Amy stood in the open foyer and smiled as her friend entered the First Bank of Saugatuck and quickly walked over to give her a hug. “Are you ready to do this?”
“Yeah.” Rosemary nodded, a small lump forming in her throat and she took a deep breath. Amy squeezed her hand and after a moment, she nodded to continue.
“Let’s go to my office and get you squared away. Do you have the paperwork?”
“Do you think Fern would let me leave the house to do any of this without it?”
“Fair enough.” The two women laughed as they sat down and for the next hour, Robert Lancaster ceased to exist on paper at the place he banked at for over twenty years. As they finished up, Rosemary snapped her fingers as a thought crossed her mind.
“I brought the safety deposit box keys, too. Can I get into those today?”
“Yep, let’s head over to the vault.” Rosemary handed over the keys as she followed Amy into the vault where she stopped to match the numbers in her hand with those in front of her. After a few beats, Amy found all three boxes, none in sequential order. After inserting the keys into the locks, she turned to her friend and smile.
“There you go. Hope he left you something good!” Amy kissed Rosemary on the cheek as she left to attend another meeting. Taking another deep breath, Rosemary turned to the boxes and opened the one closest to her. Pulling out the box, she set it on the table and lifted the lid, revealing an according file folder. Propping it upright, she peeked inside and saw what looked like documents and photos, piquing her interest.
She set the folder aside as she went to pull out drawer number two, which like the first one had been the biggest size Robert could get. As she opened it, she could hear rattling inside the box and her curiosity grew bigger. Lifting the lid gently, she found a box that had deteriorated with age and what looked like several religious artifacts strewn about inside. She gently lifted them out and laid them on the table, eyeing them carefully.
In the last box, smaller than the others, was a worn book, its leather binding split and faded ribbon tied around it. Stuck under the small length of cloth was a much newer envelope with her name on it and a wave of sadness washed through Rosemary when she recognized Robert’s distinctive block writing. Pulling it out, she held it against her chest and closed her eyes a moment. Letting the wave pass, she sat the item down with the others and put the boxes back into their homes.
She turned and looked at the table, knowing they were the key to Robert’s past – the one before Saugatuck. She pulled out a chair and sat down, gently removing the letter and opening it. She noted the date he wrote it was only a few days after his diagnosis. Taking a deep breath, she began to read with her eyes growing bigger as she skimmed each line.
My dear Rosie,
I’m sorry I’ve left you behind. I thought we would have had more years together but apparently the Lord has decided that wasn’t in His plans. I am already missing you terribly even though I know you’ll be with me to the end.
I made you my heir years ago, but while I had no qualms giving you the house, the store, and my earnings. I have not been able to give you the story of me, the real me. I am a coward for keeping it from you until after I die, but I feel this is the best way to protect you from my past so you can live your future.
These boxes, now yours, contain all that is left of who I was am - Anatoli Choryni. My life in the Ukrainian mafia seems more like a dream I keep struggling to remember. Since my early childhood, I knew nothing but mafiya life – starting as a little gofer for my dyad’ko who was a muscle man and growing into my role as hitman and later underboss.
I did an amazing number of bad things to people thinking I was making my neighborhood a better place, saving it from the encroachment of whatever group was our enemy at the time. Yet when I reached such an exalted status, I knew that I was becoming jaded with my work.
You cannot just leave the mob, however. Not when it had been your whole life like it had been for me. But, when I saw one of my underlings murder a woman in cold blood, I knew I could no longer stay. You want to kill a man who cheated you? Go ahead. You want to torture your Russian enemy? That’s fine. But you never, ever hurt women and children. Never. I made that clear to my men, to Bernard when he rose to power after his father died.
But the lifeless eyes of that woman haunted me, and I knew. I knew then, Rosie, that I had to flee. I planned it so meticulously – draining my accounts slowly, hoarding money in my bed like my babyusa used to do in the old days under Stalin. I hoarded my papers, my faith, the evidence of my crimes for months on end.
Then one day, I did it. I faked my death and fled. First north to Wisconsin and then east to Michigan before landing in New York City. There I hid for a full year before I went and legally changed my name. I left the city and took up as a clerk for a bookstore in some small town in Pennsylvania. I stayed there for two years and when it looked like I had no one on my tail, I came to Saugatuck.
I started the store and the rest is history. And by now, if you’re reading this, my probate has cleared, and you probably learned I was clean and easy. Everything is legal, I made sure of it for my own safety and then for you after you came into my life. And if the person reading this isn’t Rosie, then well, I’m not as smart as I’d like to think I am.
I was not a good man, I did terrible things, but I hope I eased the red in my life book some with all the good I did after I came to Michigan. I’ll find out when my last breath leaves me, but until then, I will spend my last months embracing our friendship. You have never left me before and I know you won’t leave me now.
And because of that I owed all of this to you. My life story.
Ya tebe lyublyu, Rosie.
Robert
“What the fuck…”
—***—
Translations:
mafiya - Mafia
dyad’ko - Uncle
babyusa - Grandmother
Ya tebe lyublyu - I love you
Reblogging the most recent chapter because I have nothing new to add yet. Life is super busy at work and I’m finishing up major responsibilities for a board I’ll be leaving soon, so not as much writing time as before.
I think I liked quarantine only because I got a lot of writing done.
A/N: Happy fall y’all! Still a little stuck on this story - trying to get where I’m at to where I want it to be is proving to be a royal jackass pain, I swear. But, here is another chapter and I hate to end it the way I did, but, oh well! Chapter 9 is in the works!
Reminder: I ain’t ever seen Pedro Pascal in FUCK ALL, I’m just coming up with this as I go along, using imdb.com, wiki, and 84,000 tabs I got open to plan out this shit. I also write soft versions of his characters so if you’re craving asshole vibes, I ain’t got any but my own to offer.
Part 8 –Fate is not the Answer, it is Merely the Key
“Welcome back, agent!” Marquetta’s voice rang across the lobby in welcome and as Pike ambled over to the welcome desk, he was awashed with the same sensation that he had the day before – a sense of coming home. For all the places he lived and worked in his career, nowhere had ever felt like this before. Strange.
“What can we do for you today?” The young woman’s voice cut through his thoughts and he felt a little chagrined to be caught daydreaming on the job. He straightened his shoulders and flashed a smile at her. It took everything in Marquetta to not swoon on the spot. Lord was he a handsome man.
“I’m sorry to come by unannounced, it’s becoming a bad habit. But I need a few things from Ms. Carter that I forgot to retrieve yesterday. Is she around?”
“She is, why don’t you go on up. She was in her office last time I called up and that was about, oh… ten minutes ago.”
“Thanks!” Marcus waved at her as he walked towards the stairs and he could feel the woman’s stare burning a hole through the seat of his pants and he couldn’t help but smile. She was not subtle at all and it did stoke his ego a bit, but all it did was amuse him rather than push him to ask her out like it would have in the past. Strange.
-*-
Rosemary never liked complete silence, something about it unnerved her and she became known for playing music wherever she was. The rest of the staff had gotten used to it, not blinking an eye if she was one day playing sea shanties while pulling items from the vaults for research or hearing AC/DC float out of her office while she pounded out grant narratives.
In the aftermath of the break-in, she chose to work in silence. It was a non-verbal way of blaming herself for what had happened - deep down she believed that if she hadn’t played music, she probably would have heard her attackers coming. Helen eventually said something in passing about the lack of music and within days, the director smiled to herself when the strains of Heart were heard coming from Rosemary’s office.
The swinging sounds of the Andrews Sisters filled the workroom as Rosemary worked on repairing the Austrian crystal damaged during the attack. Despite their destruction of the workroom, very few pieces had been outright damaged, with the crystal taking the brunt of it. She avoided the repair job over the last few weeks, not wanting to see such a visual reminder of her assault. But something Amy had mentioned in passing made her think that if she repaired the glass, then maybe something that had broken inside of her would be fixed, too.
Carefully, she wrapped a piece of painter’s tape to hold in place the piece she just glued, smoothing down the edges. As she sat back to view her handy work, a strong knock came at the door. Everything in Rosemary paused, blood suddenly roaring in her ears. She whipped around and her guest could see the barely disguised panic on her face.
Pike stopped immediately, raising his hands, and murmuring that it was just him. Not realizing she was breathing heavily, Rosemary continued to grip the workbench edge as the panic cascaded over her. The agent remained calm, using a low tone as he voiced his apologies while slowly stepping towards her. When she felt his warm palm on her shoulder and the other on her wrist, she finally took a deep breath and looked into his eyes.
How kind they are, she thought. And that feeling from yesterday – the one of safety – washed over her, leaving no room for the panic to grip her tight. Her body began to relax, and she started to breathe normally again. He could tell when she was coming back to him and he gently smiled and nodded. She let out a shaky breath and nodded back, forcing a small smile on her face. A small voice in her head said she should be embarrassed for reacting that way, but the sheer kindness and understanding she saw on his face shut out such negativity.
“Agent Pike! Back so soon?” She tried to add some lightness to her voice that she didn’t really feel. He bowed his head with a small smile, his hands still on her body while his thumbs rubbing small circles of comfort into her skin.
“Yes, I’m sorry. I really should have called ahead of time. I didn’t mean to scare you.” He sighed and shook his head as he silently berated himself. He should have known better.
“No, don’t apologize, you didn’t know.” She tried to continue, but his hand gently tightened on her wrist and she stopped.
“I do. You’ve been through enough without me stirring up painful memories for you. Hurting you is the last thing I’d want to do.” They stared at each other for a beat before she nodded, and her smile finally reached her eyes.
“Okay. What can I help you with?” He smiled in relief.
“I wanted to get copies of your files on The Cornucopia so we could flesh out our case. Would that be possible?”
“Absolutely. Follow me.” Rosemary moved to get up and Pike moved back, already missing the heat of her skin under his palms. He clutched them into a quick fist before relaxing them as the pleasure of touching her skittered through his body. He hoped she didn’t notice as he turned to follow her, his long legs keeping perfect stride with hers as they walked towards her office.
“Question Agent Pike.” She slowed down and waved him into her office. He bowed his head as he walked past her. Banana sat up on the couch, his tail wagging quickly at the sight of his new friend and both laughed. Pike bent over to give the dog a friendly scratch behind the ears as he responded.
“Go ahead.”
“Since our records are now wrong, can I get a copy of the piece’s history so I can have the most updated version? I’d like for it to be as correct as possible.”
“Sure, I understand.”
“Great!” Rosemary smiled at him again as she walked around her desk to her filing cabinet, pulling open a drawer and shifting through the files. As she thumbed through them, Pike placed his briefcase on her desk, watching her out of the corner of his eye. While most of the panic had left, he could still see tenseness in her shoulders that wasn’t there before. He internally sighed, mad at himself for being so stupid.
When she withdrew the correct file, she began pulling off paperclips so it could be fed through the copier faster. When she looked towards him, she noticed the file in his hand, and she reached out to take it. Rosemary wasn’t expecting it to be so heavy and she bungled a bit before the file folder slipped from her hands and everything spilled out onto her desk. A high pitched ‘oh shit’ left her mouth before she realized it and immediately began to clean up the mess she made.
As she fumbled with the papers, Pike leaned to help her, feeling his ears grow warm with each brush of her fingers against his. He cleared his throat as he assembled the case report back in order, shuffling the papers to hide his attraction to her. She had been focused on cleaning up the case photos when she suddenly stopped, standing stock still.
The agent noted her change and realize the tenseness he observed before was still there, but it felt different as she stared intently at a photo in her hand. He dropped his head to try and look her in the eye when he asked her if anything was wrong. When she looked at him, his breath stuttered in chest – her eyes were sparkling in excitement, something he had yet to see from her and the sheer joy of that look rendered him mute.
“Agent Pike, does that report say anything about who rescued the statue in 1946?” Her voice seemed to vibrate with excitement, and he could feel it seep into his bones as he shook his head no. “Okay, do you believe in fate, the universe, coincidences? Any of that?”
“Sometimes, I suppose. Why do you ask?”
With glee, Rosemary flipped around the photo she had been looking at, a modern scan of a black and white image. The glossiness made it hard to see, but when she angled her wrist, he realized it was a photo of the Monument Men team that had recovered The Cornucopia and the other pieces stolen from the Luxembourg ducal family. But he was confused still, the feeling clearly etched on his face and she giggled. Actually giggled.
“My dear agent,” She pointed to a tall man with a hauntingly familiar smile on his face that stood out against his shorter, more sober-faced fellow soldiers. “meet George Carter, US Army Captain and an original member of the Monument Men team during the War. That’s my grandfather holding The Cornucopia.”
Pike’s eyes shot up to look at Rosemary and she laughed again. He turned to glance at her wall, realizing he had been looking at a picture of the same man yesterday. The photo was almost similar, except George stood next to a large painting. He wondered if they were from around the same time or if one was older than the other. He turned back to Rosemary.
“I don’t know what this means exactly, but it looks like when it comes to rescuing The Cornucopia, the Carters have this handled.”
“Meaning what exactly?”
“Meaning that I firmly believe you’ll find the piece and bring it home. Wherever that may be.”
“You do?”
“I do.”
—***—
Three weeks later
The chill of the blustery November day was seeping into Rosemary’s bones and she shivered as she trudged up to the backdoor of the house. Her fingers fumbled with the key to unlock the house and when the door finally swung open, she stumbled backwards as Banana rushed through the house to his bed near the heat register in the living room.
“Thank you, my ever-loving companion!” She called out to the dog as she took off her coat and scarf. The Home was toasty, but the chill of the kitchen tile still crept though her socks as she toed off her shoes. Padding over to the fridge, she pulled out some milk for her favorite hot cocoa and before she could pull out the saucepan, her phone began to ring. Noting it was Fern’s ringtone, she immediately answered it.
“Hey Ferny Fern, what’s up?”
“I got great news! The probate cleared today!”
“What?! So soon?” Rosemary set the milk jug on the counter and began to dance through the kitchen in joy.
“I know, I wasn’t expecting to be so quick, but I was told everything was in such neat order that it was quote one of the easiest probates I’ve cleared unquote.”
“So, does this mean what I think it means?”
“It means you’re free and clear just to live your life and run your new business.” Fern’s smile was evident through the phone as much as Rosemary’s heavy breath from her celebratory dance party.
“Okay, I’m going to celebrate. What are you doing tonight?”
“Winston is back in town from that conference he went to, so we’re having dinner.”
“Sure, who’s on the menu first, you or him?” There was no hiding the cheeky grin in Rosemary’s voice as she poured milk into the saucepan and turned up the heat.
“Quiet.” Fern huffed over phone. “Lunch on Saturday instead?”
“Maybe dinner, let’s see what Amy and Tina think.”
The two women chatted a little longer before hanging up and Rosemary grinned at nothing as her milk began to heat up. What a weight off her shoulders.
—***—
“Rosemary!” Amy stood in the open foyer and smiled as her friend entered the First Bank of Saugatuck and quickly walked over to give her a hug. “Are you ready to do this?”
“Yeah.” Rosemary nodded, a small lump forming in her throat and she took a deep breath. Amy squeezed her hand and after a moment, she nodded to continue.
“Let’s go to my office and get you squared away. Do you have the paperwork?”
“Do you think Fern would let me leave the house to do any of this without it?”
“Fair enough.” The two women laughed as they sat down and for the next hour, Robert Lancaster ceased to exist on paper at the place he banked at for over twenty years. As they finished up, Rosemary snapped her fingers as a thought crossed her mind.
“I brought the safety deposit box keys, too. Can I get into those today?”
“Yep, let’s head over to the vault.” Rosemary handed over the keys as she followed Amy into the vault where she stopped to match the numbers in her hand with those in front of her. After a few beats, Amy found all three boxes, none in sequential order. After inserting the keys into the locks, she turned to her friend and smile.
“There you go. Hope he left you something good!” Amy kissed Rosemary on the cheek as she left to attend another meeting. Taking another deep breath, Rosemary turned to the boxes and opened the one closest to her. Pulling out the box, she set it on the table and lifted the lid, revealing an according file folder. Propping it upright, she peeked inside and saw what looked like documents and photos, piquing her interest.
She set the folder aside as she went to pull out drawer number two, which like the first one had been the biggest size Robert could get. As she opened it, she could hear rattling inside the box and her curiosity grew bigger. Lifting the lid gently, she found a box that had deteriorated with age and what looked like several religious artifacts strewn about inside. She gently lifted them out and laid them on the table, eyeing them carefully.
In the last box, smaller than the others, was a worn book, its leather binding split and faded ribbon tied around it. Stuck under the small length of cloth was a much newer envelope with her name on it and a wave of sadness washed through Rosemary when she recognized Robert’s distinctive block writing. Pulling it out, she held it against her chest and closed her eyes a moment. Letting the wave pass, she sat the item down with the others and put the boxes back into their homes.
She turned and looked at the table, knowing they were the key to Robert’s past – the one before Saugatuck. She pulled out a chair and sat down, gently removing the letter and opening it. She noted the date he wrote it was only a few days after his diagnosis. Taking a deep breath, she began to read with her eyes growing bigger as she skimmed each line.
My dear Rosie,
I’m sorry I’ve left you behind. I thought we would have had more years together but apparently the Lord has decided that wasn’t in His plans. I am already missing you terribly even though I know you’ll be with me to the end.
I made you my heir years ago, but while I had no qualms giving you the house, the store, and my earnings. I have not been able to give you the story of me, the real me. I am a coward for keeping it from you until after I die, but I feel this is the best way to protect you from my past so you can live your future.
These boxes, now yours, contain all that is left of who I was am - Anatoli Choryni. My life in the Ukrainian mafia seems more like a dream I keep struggling to remember. Since my early childhood, I knew nothing but mafiya life – starting as a little gofer for my dyad’ko who was a muscle man and growing into my role as hitman and later underboss.
I did an amazing number of bad things to people thinking I was making my neighborhood a better place, saving it from the encroachment of whatever group was our enemy at the time. Yet when I reached such an exalted status, I knew that I was becoming jaded with my work.
You cannot just leave the mob, however. Not when it had been your whole life like it had been for me. But, when I saw one of my underlings murder a woman in cold blood, I knew I could no longer stay. You want to kill a man who cheated you? Go ahead. You want to torture your Russian enemy? That’s fine. But you never, ever hurt women and children. Never. I made that clear to my men, to Bernard when he rose to power after his father died.
But the lifeless eyes of that woman haunted me, and I knew. I knew then, Rosie, that I had to flee. I planned it so meticulously – draining my accounts slowly, hoarding money in my bed like my babyusa used to do in the old days under Stalin. I hoarded my papers, my faith, the evidence of my crimes for months on end.
Then one day, I did it. I faked my death and fled. First north to Wisconsin and then east to Michigan before landing in New York City. There I hid for a full year before I went and legally changed my name. I left the city and took up as a clerk for a bookstore in some small town in Pennsylvania. I stayed there for two years and when it looked like I had no one on my tail, I came to Saugatuck.
I started the store and the rest is history. And by now, if you’re reading this, my probate has cleared, and you probably learned I was clean and easy. Everything is legal, I made sure of it for my own safety and then for you after you came into my life. And if the person reading this isn’t Rosie, then well, I’m not as smart as I’d like to think I am.
I was not a good man, I did terrible things, but I hope I eased the red in my life book some with all the good I did after I came to Michigan. I’ll find out when my last breath leaves me, but until then, I will spend my last months embracing our friendship. You have never left me before and I know you won’t leave me now.
And because of that I owed all of this to you. My life story.
A/N:I pounded this bad boy out in 30 minutes, that’s how badly the idea needed to be written.
Reminder:I ain’t ever seen Pedro Pascal in FUCK ALL, I’m just coming up with this as I go along, using imdb.com, wiki, and 84,000 tabs I got open to plan out this shit. I also write soft versions of his characters so if you’re craving asshole vibes, I ain’t got any but my own to offer.
“What’s that smile for, you silly man?” You cock your head towards Marcus as he lays in bed, watching you finish toweling off from your shower. He slowly shakes his head.
“Nothing.”
“Hmm, I doubt that, Mr. Pike.” He continues to smile as you toss your towel on the arm of the reading chair, your nudity on full display for him and somehow that grin of his gets impossibly larger. You slowly walk towards him, feeling his eyes rake across your body, still flush from the hot shower you took.
You reach the edge of the bed and begin to crawl across it until your right next to him. You bend your head down to pepper soft kisses along his bare shoulder and you internally grin as you felt his muscles bunch and jump beneath your touch. You remain on all fours but lower your upper half so that you rest on your elbows, nipples tightening as your breasts sway against the soft sheets.
“Hello.” You brush your lips against his, letting the velvet skin send a shiver down your spine.
“Hello.” He kisses you back, his tongue begging entrance into your mouth and the shivers grow as you open to him. With your ass and core tilted upwards, you can feel the coolness of the room more intently as you began to get wetter.
You continue to kiss for long minutes and you’re so focused on the sensation of his lips and tongue against your mouth, you fail to notice that he has snaked his arm underneath you. Suddenly his thick fingers cup your mound and you rear back, gasping in pleasure and surprise. He continues to smile, a lazy tinge to it as his eyes drop to half-mast in pleasure.
He runs two fingers between the lips of your core, rubbing gently as he passes over your clit and you moan in pleasure, thighs wanting to clasp together. You drop your face to press it into his shoulder and your hands begin to grasp the sheets beneath you to anchor yourself against the onslaught of pleasure.
Marcus slows his ministrations and your hips jerk, seeking the friction he denies you. Suddenly, his fingers return to your clit and begin to rub in agonizingly slow circles. You gasp harshly against his skin and the moan you let out seems so loud. Your body trembles as the pleasure courses through you and you finally force yourself to look up at his face.
The bastard is stillsmiling!
You growl against his skin and before you can say anything, he drags his fingers up your slit and sinks two of them into you - deeply. Your gasp is loud, and you surge forward, practically screaming into his skin. Just as before, he kept a steady, but almost maddeningly slow pace.
“Marcus!” You moan against his skin, burying your face into his warmth. “Please!”
You can’t see his smile morph into a smirk, but he was never one to deny you anything, so he obliges and increases his pace, letting the heel of his hand rub against your clit. Your hips jerk in time, fucking his hand as best you can even as your thighs shake from the raw pleasure coursing through you.
Before you know it, your pleasure crests and you come hard, almost impossibly so, screaming into his shoulder and eyes rolling into the back of your head. Your hips jerk and shake against his hand, which is stilled. When you stop, he slowly removes his hand and you drop your forehead against him.
You are in a daze, feelings of pleasure still pulsating throughout your body when you feel Marcus shift. But in the haze of your mind, you’re not quick enough to lift your head before he kneels behind you. He drags his hand up your spine and lays it on the back of your neck, fingers slowly massaging the skin there.
His light touch sends sparks of pleasure down your body, where they congregate in your now jerking hips. His smile, which has yet to leave his lips, takes on a more feral look as he rubs the head of his aching cock against you.
“Marcus!” You cry into the sheet, grasping at the fabric so hard that your knuckles have gone white. He relents and sinks into you with one shift of his hips. You cry out at the invasion, hips jerking in pleasure. His hands land on your skin, holding you tight for a moment.
He loves to feel you pulsating around his cock and he must force himself not to come just yet. When you whimper, he lets his hips draw back and then forward. Like with his fingers, he sets a maddeningly slow pace and you can barely breathe as the pleasure claws at your chest, your lungs, your heart.
You pull yourself up onto your hands, arms shaking from the pleasure that has seemed to rob you of your strength. And yet, you use the leverage to push back against his hips harder, pulling a moan from his chest. Your pants are loud, almost shrill as he begins to fuck you harder.
You never came off the high of your previous orgasm, so every move of his cock inside of you wrings every drop of want from you until your whole body is shaking in response. Soon, the tautness of your belly breaks again, and you clamp down hard on his cock and scream loudly into the pillow, throat nearly hurting from the rawness of it all.
You hear him groan behind you and with a few quick thrusts, he is coming and following you into the pleasure storm. After what seems like long minutes, he withdraws from you and you both collapse onto the bed. You turn your head and notice that his smile has been wiped off his face. And you can’t help but start smiling yourself. His eyes are closed as he struggles to capture his breath, but one of them crack open and sees you laying there with a large grin on your face.
A/N: I’ve been quiet and I’m sorry, but I’ve hit a bit of a wall. Plus work is hectic right now and I’m not in a writing mood. I’ve got at least one more chapter written in full after this one and chapter 9 is in the works, but I feel bad that I’m so quiet. I see the love you’re showing and I’m here for it. As a thank you, this chapter is over 4K words.
Reminder: I ain’t ever seen Pedro Pascal in FUCK ALL, I’m just coming up with this as I go along, using imdb.com, wiki, and 84,000 tabs I got open to plan out this shit. I also write soft versions of his characters so if you’re craving asshole vibes, I ain’t got any but my own to offer.
As Marcus Pike exited his rental vehicle, he couldn’t help but smile at the large, three story building in front of him. The Fort Jamison Historical Museum was housed in a former high school, but it’s turrets, ivy covered walls, and stained-glass windows seemed less hallowed halls of education and more akin to a fancy home. Regardless, he was charmed by what he saw.
When he entered the building, that charmed feeling continued and as he paused to get his bearings, he briefly wondered if he had enough time to visit the rest of the museum. The lobby of the FJHM was open, with large windows letting in the mid-morning sunlight, giving the burnished wood of the floor and trim a soft glow. The walls were draped in large banners featuring what he assumed were pictures from their collections and a seating area to the left of the welcome desk already had a few visitors chattering excitedly amongst themselves.
As he walked further into the space towards the desk, he noted a young woman to his left as she was filling a display case with what looked to be old calculators and to his right was an older gentleman filling a brochure stand. His steps alerted the man to his arrival and Pike watched as he quickly walked over to the desk to greet him.
After explaining what he was there for, the older man nodded and gave Pike the directions he needed to head upstairs to the office space. After being directed towards the stairs, the agent found himself taking them slowly, reading the display labels next to impressive pictures of the area. Once he stepped foot on the third floor, he realized he hadn’t been told which way to go. After a pause, Pike trusted his gut and picked a direction.
Two doors down from the stairwell was the very place he was looking for. Success.
As he entered the office of this Rosemary Carter, he felt immediately as if he had finally come home and he startled at the sensation. And not that it wasn’t a homey place to be, but that he felt as if he was meant to be there. A small part of him felt a sense of déjà vu, as if he had been here before, even though he never even heard of Ms. Carter or the museum or any of this prior to two weeks ago.
Shaking off the feeling, Pike looked around the space and smiled as he realized she was the opposite of a minimalist. Bookshelves lined at least two walls, the room was stuffed with furniture, and he was certain there wasn’t a speck of wall space left. The man at the front desk said Ms. Carter hadn’t arrived at work yet, so he took the chance look around and get to know the woman he was about to question.
His crew had completed a preliminary report on this Ms. Carter before he left DC where things like her impressive education and work history was discussed, along with reports on her volunteer activities and a few other things. But nothing really told him about her as a person and Pike always felt that getting to know someone was the best way to determine if they were a suspect or not.
Several articles lined the walls and he skimmed the stories, discovering that she had been at the museum for nearly half her career, that she was a specialist in decorative arts, and that she was passionate about her career. One article about a fundraiser was accompanied by a photo of the curator laughing while covered in whipped cream and surrounded by giggling school children. He felt himself smiling at the image, drawn in by the grin splitting her face.
He realized that was just how this Ms. Carter was and other photos lining her walls with friends and family show the same open face, the same joviality, the same laughter in all of them. There was even a photo of what looked like her receiving an award where she looked as if she was laughing gleefully.
He stepped back a moment to take a breath, as if it had been stolen from him – this was a woman who lived her life with joy and boldness at every turn. He realized that he was surrounded by it – what wasn’t brightly colored was whimsical and what wasn’t whimsical was almost cozy. Her walls were filled with children’s drawings and thank you letters were framed next to different types of textile art. He noted beautiful Ukrainian lace work framed behind her desk.
Yes, he thought, this was a woman who appreciated the beauty of life. The team’s preliminary report told him she was smart, but she was also a woman who loved fiercely and if the numerous photos were to go by, deeply loyal. He tilted his head – his original assessment had been correct; she wasn’t a suspect. Yes, she had reported it, but sometimes that didn’t mean anything as Pike had well learned in his career. However, this woman clearly feels things and probably believed that the theft was a personal afront to her.
He found himself looking intently at an old picture of several men in uniform posing with some artwork when he heard a throat clear behind him. He quickly straightened up and turned around, spotting Rosemary by the door. His face lit up at the sight of her and his smile was large, almost a grin as if he were glad to finally see her. He stepped away from the wall and held out his hand as she walked towards him.
““I’m Special Agent Marcus Pike.”
“I’m Rosemary Carter. Welcome to Fort Jamison.”
“And who’s this?” Pike bent down to hold out his hand for the dog at her side to sniff, but Banana rarely met a person he didn’t like and immediately walked between the man’s knees to beg for scratches, his stumpy tail wagging happily. Pike set his briefcase on the floor and yielded to the dog willingly with both hands.
“This is Banana.” Rosemary’s voice was tinged with a laugh and Pike thought it a beautiful sound. “He’s a good boy, but I’m sorry he’s being so rude and getting fur all over your suit. Normally he just goes to his corner of the couch and goes right to sleep.”
“No! It’s fine, I love dogs, grew up with them. What breed is he?”
“I have no idea, even the shelter didn’t know.” She laughed as the dog’s eyes dropped to half mast as Pike found his sweet spot. If the dog could have groaned in pleasure, he probably would have. “I just asked for a laid-back dog and Banana and I clicked, the rest is history.”
“So, can I ask where the name came from?” He looked up at Rosemary as she stood there, leaning on one leg and arms crossed. Her face was contorted into a smile-grimace, her embarrassment easy to read in her eyes. He thought it adorable and he couldn’t stop smiling like an idiot.
“In truth? I’m not a hundred percent sure, but I think I was joking around and then it just stuck. But it fits for some weird reason. Baba, leave the man alone.” She waved at the dog who deftly ignored her in favor of his new friend. She sighed, her head hanging down in defeat and he chuckled. “Anyway, agent, please have a seat. If I had known someone was coming, I’d have at least cleaned my office and had a few things prepared for you.”
“No need to apologize. You didn’t know and I realize now I should have said something prior to arriving. So, this is all my fault. Please, take your time.”
She heaved a sigh of relief and waved him over to an overstuffed chair in front of her desk. She walked around the heavy oak piece, hanging her shoulder bag on a wall hook that was designed to look like the ass end of a dog with the tail as the hook. He could see a small plaque that said ‘Clyde’ attached to the base of it. Those little whimsical touches in her office just made him want to stay longer, get to know her more. He unbuttoned the last one on his jacket and sat down, settling into the surprisingly comfortable chair.
Just as she sat down herself, Banana suddenly jumped into Pike’s lap, wiggling around until he was comfortable, his head resting on the crook of his new seat’s elbow. The agent’s face took on a look of surprise before he started to laugh, but Rosemary made a horrified sound, standing back up.
“Banana! Get down!” She moved to come around the desk, but Pike held up his free hand to stop her and she paused, looking at the dog before looking back at him. She was hyper-aware that people don’t always like dogs sitting on them and she was sure the heat in her cheeks made her as red as a tomato. He must think of her as a bad dog owner.
“He’s fine, he’s fine. Let him be.”
“Are you sure?”
“Positive.” His flashed a smile at her and she stop, hesitating a moment before she nodded and went to sit back down. He continued to pet the dog as she got settled, watching her as subtly as he could. He knew what she looked like, of course, but to see someone in person is different than seeing them in photos. He noted that the brown of her hair had a tinge of red to it and that she was grayer in person than she had been in the images that he saw.
Her face was smooth, but he could see the laugh lines around her eyes, remembering the way they crinkled as she smiled at him. And again, with that smile of hers! He felt as if he could live in it and never find a more comfortable home. What surprised him was her height - she was tall, something the report didn’t tell him, and he was glad he could look directly into her hazel eyes with little physical effort on his part. She gnawed on her lips as she fumbled around gathering everything up for this unscheduled meeting and he noted they were red from her ministration.
A thought of how those lips would look after he kissed them flittered through his brain before disappearing. He cleared his throat and stood up as straight as he could with the dog in his lap as those eyes, magnified by her glasses, glanced up at him in question.
“I read the theft report from the police and of course what you submitted, but if you could, just tell me the whole story.” Pike glanced over at her and she nodded.
“I was working late…” Pike held up his hand, stopping her.
“No, start from the very beginning – you never mentioned how you acquired the piece. I’d like to know everything that led to it being stolen.” She nodded and sat back, telling the story from the very beginning. At one point, she swiveled her chair towards her filing cabinet to pull out The Cornucopia’s file, passing it over to him. He interjected with questions periodically, but mostly he sat and listened to her in such an intense way that Rosemary felt almost shy under his gaze.
“Do you know much about the piece before Robert purchased it?”
“Other than what’s written in the history, no. I didn’t even know he had it until he gave to us in June.”
“It says here that it’s restricted, what does that mean.”
“That tells us the donor gave it to us with limitations. Normally we don’t take those, but we make a few exceptions, obviously Robert being one of them.” She indicated for him to flip over the page he was looking at. “There is the list. It comes down to that we store it and that’s it. No advertising, no mentioning it, nothing.”
“So, publicly no one knew you had this piece?”
“Correct. Until the report of the theft came out in the papers, the only ones who knew we had it were me, Helen since she’s the director, and of course Robert.”
“None of the rest of the staff?”
“No, there was no need to, while he gave such harsh restrictions, I treated his donation like any other. So, most of the items that went into the vault weren’t talked about with staff. Usually if I do bring them into the loop it’s because it’ll be going on display and our front line needs to be able to ask questions.”
“In full honesty, we investigated your institution before I came out here and if I recall you announced the donation of seven quilts from Mr. Lancaster in late June. Why?”
“You didn’t read too far into the article then; we made the announcement as part of our general statement on our quilt exhibit downstairs.”
“Exhibit?” Rosemary smiled and pulled a file from the holder on her desk, handing it over. As he opened it, he saw an ad for a quilt exhibit. He looked back up at her.
“We only had two physical quilts in our collection that we could officially say were Michigan made. Robert’s donation gave us seven more that we knew were locally made, giving us more artifacts for the exhibit and a boost in publicity. Robert was well known around here and well liked. Announcing those quilts brought in twelve more temporary loans.”
Pike nodded as he glanced through the file and went back to the first folder he was holding. He reached down on the side of the chair and patted at the thin air, realizing his briefcase was on the other side of the office. He tried to figure out how to reach it while not disturbing the dog, but he didn’t have to think long as Rosemary sensed his dilemma and quickly got up.
As she moved, he noted how graceful she was, even with her long limbs, and she bent over, he admired the sleek lines of her body. She stood up and he quickly looked away, lest he was caught ogling. She nodded when he smiled in thanks and his breath nearly hitched in his chest when she bent over to scratch Banana’s ears on her way back to her desk. She smelled of fresh linens and summer breezes and his mind made him think of billowing sheets, soft sighs, and dappled sunlight.
“Can I ask how you stored the piece? It says it was kept in a cabinet?” He had pulled out a notepad, scribbling a few things down to add to the report later.
“Yes, while my work room is locked when not in use, I have a specific cabinet that I can lock, with only me having access to the key.” She sat back, tapping her chin. “I had it installed about four years ago and had three spare keys made at the time. I damaged one about two years ago and a second one about this time last year. So, there is my main key and then the spare under my workbench.”
“Is that normal?”
“The lock and key routine? Not really, the idea had been to create a place where valuable or unstable items could be stored out of people’s reach. Outside of the statue, I can only think of three other times I kept artifacts locked up and those were highly dangerous items I couldn’t let others touch until they were disposed of properly.”
“Is that a problem here? Touching items when asked not to?” Rosemary snorted and Pike couldn’t help but chuckle at her response.
“Agent Pike, I don’t know how well you know people, but I can assure that the little monkey brain in all of us will do the opposite of what they are told. I had a special behind-the-scenes tour last spring and found one of our members attempting to take apart a three hundred-year-old clock on my bench. And the worst part? The item was on loan for an exhibit from another museum!”
“I see.” Pike laughed. “So, from what you’re saying, this was a quiet transaction and there is no reason anyone should have known you had the piece at all.”
“Pretty much.”
“Which means, they must have known about the statue beforehand.”
“I’m not sure how anyone could have. I was his best friend for ten years and I was in both his store and home often, even staying the night on occasion. Never once did I see the statue in either location, which if you knew Robert, that was something. That man lived his life on his walls – pictures, art, you name it, unless it was seasonal, it was out decorating some surface or another. And the one thing he couldn’t abide by was ugly anything, especially art.”
“Do you think The Cornucopia to be ugly?”
“In the spirit of honesty? Yes. And I know Robert would have, too. It looks like a bad drawing and I can just hear him making fun of it.” Rosemary laughed a bit and Pike smiled at the sound of her voice, an even tone with a hint of huskiness. Did that huskiness deepen when she was aroused, he wondered, before ignoring it.
“I see. However, it looks like he clearly owned it since he gave it to you and based on what is in this file. But it doesn’t say how he acquired it.”
“Hmm, I believe he said it was in Chicago, sometime before he moved to Saugatuck in the 1990s, but I don’t know if he said where it was purchased. Why? Do you think they’d have more history on the piece that what I have?”
“Well that’s the thing. Your entry on the NSAF alerted us because The Cornucopia was stolen from a museum in Wisconsin in 1993.”
“WHAT?” Rosemary’s feet, which had been propped up on the desk, landed hard on the floor as she shot up out of her seat. Her cry startled Banana, who jerked his head up and huffed, wondering what was going on. Without thinking, Pike began to comfort the dog with a gentle pat on the head but wasn’t entirely sure how he could calm the shocked woman before him.
“What do you mean stolen?” Her voice was steadily rising, the anxiety that she thought she pushed away after the attack, started to creep along the edges of her mind. What was going on? This agent must be wrong. “You’re wrong.”
“That’s why I’m here in person rather than conducting this interview over the phone.” He bent back down and shuffled through the files to pull out the one he was looking for. “Glancing at the background that was given to you, whoever wrote it knew the general history of the piece but modified the story to throw off anyone who was looking for it.”
“Wait. They changed the background but not the title of the piece?” He nodded. “Well that’s stupid.”
“In the spirit of honesty Ms. Carter,” Pike mimicked her words from earlier, “we rely way more on the stupidity of criminals to solve a crime than people would be comfortable with.”
With that, Pike handed over the history of the statue to Rosemary, who read through it, jaw dropping more and more as she read further into the history. He watched as her brows furrowed before shooting up at certain parts. Her sigh of resignation when she stopped reading was tinged with sadness – the whole situation was worse than she had originally thought.
“So, it’s true, then?”
“It is, we have video evidence of the theft – or as best we can have given the team that stole it spliced the video to make it seem otherwise. We have both the original statements and new ones taken just a few months ago about the situation and I’ve had people ID your photo correctly as the missing statue.”
“What does this mean for me? And for the museum?”
“It means whoever originally stole it in Wisconsin may have come back for it. And that once its recovered, it will likely go back to the ducal family.”
“Were the other curators and people attacked, too?” Pike shook his head at her question, her not realizing that the attack is what caused concern for him and his crew, giving him another reason to come in person.
“No. You were the first.”
“The first? How many times has this thing been stolen?” He bowed his head slightly at her question.
“This technically would be the third time, but this case is one of thirty over the last forty years that we believe is the work of the same team. All art pieces, all from museums and private collections. All cold cases until recently.” Her shoulders slumped at his words.
“That means whoever this was, you may not be able to catch them.”
“There is always that possibility. But I’d like to think we’re going to close this case once and for all. And bring your attackers to justice.”
“You think so, Agent Pike?”
“I do.”
—***—
“Okay and then what happened?” Tina’s voice sounded excited, her eyes sparkling as Rosemary paused her story. She, Amy, and Fern leaned in, eager to hear what the rest of the tale was. They had stopped by for dinner and trick or treating but were far more interested in the story of this Agent Pike.
“Um, we talked for a while longer before he went to meet with Helen. I think they were in her office for like two hours or something. I don’t know, I was too busy doing something else. And then he had me walk him through the attack as best I could, asking a lot of questions that even the police didn’t.”
“Like what?” Asked Amy.
“Like how they talked or if they use weapons. I think he even asked me about language.” The other women cocked their heads and nodded. “I think he talked to Bob and Marquetta. Scratch that, I know he talked to them because Marquetta was giggling like an idiot when she came up stairs to tell me he was staying to visit the museum.”
“He stayed?” Tina took another sip of her cocoa, eyes twinkling in the darkness. “Did you see him before he left?”
“Yeah, I went down to say good-bye and to thank him for taking this seriously and ended up giving him a tour. I even took him into the vaults. He asked a lot of great questions and even identified three paintings we had in the collection but no information on. I made him stay a bit longer to help me update their database entries.”
“Oooooh the vaults!” Amy’s voice was teasing. Rosemary was finicky about who went into her domain, so her taking a strange man in there had the girls buzzing amongst themselves. Sly grins were hidden by mug rims as they waited for her to continue. While she was being very vague with the story, she had talked about the agent all night, mentioning things like his smile or how he treated Banana.
“Shut up!” Rosemary cried, looking down into her hot cocoa, her face feeling flush suddenly.
“What does the agent think?” Fern patted Rosemary’s forearm in an encouraging way, knowing her friend was a little embarrassed by their teasing. Unlike her friends, Rosemary was single and rarely talked about her many failed dates. For her to be so chatty about this Agent Pike had them all on alert.
“That this was a piece that was stolen before and somehow Robert ended up with it, so they came to take it back. But he’s worried because they never attacked anyone until me.” She sighed, leaning her head back. “He thinks they can find the piece, but now there is a chance that we can’t keep it because it belongs to the royal family in Luxembourg still.”
“Do you think Robert knew that? All the stuff that the agent told you?” Amy asked as she went to get more cocoa to fill their mugs. The last of the trick or treaters had left hours ago, but the quartet remained on the porch. “That the statue was stolen?”
“I don’t know, I’ve asked him, and he just stares at me all stony faced.” Rosemary took another sip as her friends paused for a moment. When they started laughing, so did Rosemary, the group’s voices echoing off the nearby houses. They finally hushed themselves as best they could through all the giggles and snorts.
“That is a stupid ass joke, Rose!” Tina was blotting at a wet spot on the knee of her jeans where she spit out her drink, her giggles not stopping no matter how hard she tried. “We’re being serious!”
“So am I! You don’t say anything, but you know I go to the cemetery to talk to him. I’ve asked a thousand times, trying to rack my brain about this stupid statue. But honest to god it never came up until he gave it to the museum in June.” Rosemary sighed, her ribs hurting her again, an ache that didn’t seem to go away no matter what she did. “He had a whole life before Saugatuck we know nothing about. And it’s not like I’ll ever get answers to what it was like.”
—***—
“Pike! You’re blushing!” Carmichael’s voice was filled with giddiness as she watched her partner’s face on the video conference call. He ducked his head and looked away, fighting a smile that wanted to play on his lips. He refused to give his partner the satisfaction even though all he talked about for the last hour was Ms. Carter and not the case itself, which gave him away. “Oooooh, you like this Ms. Carter, don’t you?”
“No!”
“Hehehehe!” There was that rare giggle from Carmichael again, she clapped her hands together in delight. “You totally do! Look how red you are!”
“You’re imagining things, it’s probably just your camera all messed up. This is serious. Rosemary was hurt badly by all this!” Pike huffed, mad at himself that he couldn’t hide his emotions better. Stupid face.
“Rosemary? Are you two on first name basis now? How adorable!”
“Brenda! Stop it!”
“No. This is the best thing to happen in months.” She laughed with delight; her seriousness was a front she put on at work. In her private life, Brenda Carmichael was an avowed romantic and loved everything about love. She watched every cheesy romance movie on Hallmark, cried buckets of happy tears over the romance novels she read, and did whatever she could to nurture love in her world.
It’s probably why all of Pike’s romantic failures have hurt her more than him because she knows deep in her heart that Marcus Pike was a real-life romance novel hero and he just needed his heroine. She had tried for several months to play matchmaker to no avail. But to watch him get doe-eyed over this curator? She was downright gleeful.
Reminder: I ain’t ever seen Pedro Pascal in FUCK ALL, I’m just coming up with this as I go along, using imdb.com, wiki, and 84,000 tabs I got open to plan out this shit. I also write soft versions of his characters so if you’re craving asshole vibes, I ain’t got any but my own to offer.
Part 6 –Step Forward, Step Back, Find Your Partner Quick
Helen tried her best to console a distraught Rosemary as Officer Garcia spoke to several of his colleagues in the hallway. Her screams had startled the director, who was already on edge due to the break-in and if the circumstances had been different, the look of surprise and horror on the officer’s face would have reduced Helen to peals of laughter. But all the situation did was add worry to her shoulders.
For nearly two hours, the officers questioned Rosemary about the break-in, about the missing piece, and they kept asking if the museum had any enemies. As much as she wanted to say Fred Breyers out of pure spite, Rosemary kept her mouth shut – sure some people weren’t always pleased with some of their program or exhibit topics, but nothing that would result in the theft of an artifact or the physical beating of a staff member. The two women were exhausted by the time the three cops left the building. Rosemary laid on the couch in her office, a wet cloth over her eyes as the lingering headache from the attack ramped up under this new stress.
“Rose, are you going to be okay?” Helen’s voice was soft, but unable to keep the worried tone at bay.
“I honestly don’t know. That statue was the only thing missing. I don’t know if I’m upset because I promised Robert we’d care for it or mad as hell that accepting that ugly ass hunk of bronze led to all of this and possibly hurt the museum’s reputation.” She sighed heavily, the now cool cloth doing little to help her. She slowly sat up, swinging her legs over the sofa’s edge.
“I wouldn’t worry about our reputation. I’m already working with Marquetta on a press release to get ahead of the game. Louis over at the Caller always does right by us, I’ll give him the scoop first and he’ll spin it in our favor.” Helen leaned back. “I’ll also call major donors today to inform them of the situation.”
“I’m sorry, Helen. I never thought this would have happened!” The younger woman groaned heavily as she tried to stand, but the director held out her hand to keep her from getting up. The body stilled.
“Did Francois’ report show anything differently than what Robert had given you?” Before Robert’s health worsened, Rosemary contacted an old friend of hers to appraise the piece as Helen wanted a second opinion for the insurance company. The in-depth discussion about the findings with Helen was moved back first by Robert’s death and then the attack. “Are we still looking at the same value?”
“I reread it the day before the attack to prep for the meeting that never obviously happened, and he seems to agree with the assessment Robert gave us. The statue was processed into the collections several months ago and I put in Robert’s information, but never got around to putting in Francois’ report.”
“Well, so long as the original value was imputed into the report, it’ll give us something for the insurance company.”
“Are we going to report it lost? What if they recover it?”
“Rose, I don’t mean to sound mean, but I doubt these officers are going to find the piece. Whoever has it is probably long gone by now.” Helen glanced over at her. “Unless a miracle happens.”
“Well good thing I believe in manifestation and miracles.” For the first time in what seemed like a long while, Rosemary smiled as her old humor began to shine through. The director smiled back, unable to let the infectious comment not affect her.
“We’ll see.”
—***—
Two Weeks Later
“Pike! Get in here!” Carmichael’s voice carried through the small cluster of offices their department occupied. “Pike!”
“I’m coming! Damn, give me a second!” Pike grumbled as he scurried from his office and across to hers. She wasn’t a loud person, so the excited shout she gave had everyone around her curious. As Pike entered the room, he could see his partner standing behind her desk, doing a little hop-dance. He raised an eyebrow.
“You need to look at this!” She pointed at the computer, her smile so big it nearly took over her face. He stopped because she was giggling, Carmichael never giggled. Whatever this was, it had to been good. Pike came around the desk and bent down to see what she was looking at and when his eyes landed on the screen, his eyes bugged out and his jaw dropped.
“This is one of them, isn’t it?” Carmichael asked, her voice quivering in excitement. He ran out of the office to the command center for the cold cases, his presence startling his crew. He looked over at the evidence board and ripped off a picture hanging in the middle before rifling through one of the boxes to find the corresponding file. He ran back to the office.
The picture in his hand was faded with time, that grainy look of age that pictures older pictures were taking on, but despite those flaws, the sculpture in the photo matched the one in the new alert in the NSAF database. The Cornucopia had always been breathtaking.
And it’s been missing since 1993.
The agents glanced over the dossier, reviewing the piece to try and discover how this priceless Russian artifact made its way to what looks like a small museum in Western Michigan. Neither had reviewed the original case file closely and both felt their jaws dropping as they read further and further into its history:
A rare example of the early Ukrainian Avant Garde art movement, The Cornucopia was created by Artem Chumak, a well-known artist from Odessa. Commissioned by the then-governor of the country as a gift to Czar Nicolas II in 1907, the piece was designed to showcase the entirety of the Ukraine in a single moment. Because the country was known for its agriculture, Chumak chose to use the image of the cornucopia as his inspiration.
The piece is made of bronze and inlaid with the following precious gemstones:
Siberian diamond
Ural sapphire
Ural ruby
Ural jade
Russian emerald
Russian opal
Ukrainian pearl
Upon the fall of the Russian empire in 1917, Dowager Empress Maria Feodorovna Romanov took the piece along with several others from the royal art collection when she fled Russia. She remained owner of the piece until 1920, when she sold it to the Grand Duke of Luxembourg.
In turn, the Grand Duke loaned the piece to the National Museum of History and Art and it remained with the museum until the outbreak of World War II. The ducal family took the piece back, along with several others to protect the collection from the advancement of the Nazis.
Unfortunately, the move did little good and much of the museum’s collection, including the pieces stored in the ducal family home, were taken by the Nazis, with intention of destroying them as part of the Germanization of the annexed country.
The pieces remained missing until 1949, when a team from the Monuments, Fine Arts, and Archives program (a.k.a. the Monument Men), recovered the stolen collections in a cellar in Hamburg and returned them to their respective homes. The Cornucopia was returned to the museum and was on display until the ducal family attempted to sell the piece in 1965. The sale failed and the family remained owners until the piece was loaned to the Luxembourg-American Cultural Museum in the U.S. in 1992.
In 1993, the piece was stolen from the museum and reported to the FBI’s Art Theft Squad days later. The piece has yet to be recovered despite the best attempts of the team.
Pike looked at Carmichael and they grinned at each other. While it being reported as missing didn’t mean that they had found it, it did mean that this cold case was heating up.
“Do you think we found our key?” He didn’t want to sound hopeful, but he had to admit he was optimistic that they were much closer to solving this case. The evidence they had been sifting through meticulously was painting a picture, but like a jigsaw puzzle, they were still missing pieces that brought it all together.
“I think we have.” Carmichael replied. They grinned at each other.
“Whose turn is it to go and do the interview?”
“Mine, but could you do it? Marty is out of town on business this week and I can’t leave Dinah alone.” She rarely asked to trade like this, but Pike held up his hands in understanding. They smiled, grateful they were partnered up, their work relationship had always been a smooth one.
“Sure, what could possibly happen in Michigan?”
They laughed as they started to walk to the command center.
—***—
Rosemary and Banana walked into the house, both exhausted from the day, the museum’s annual fall field trip event a cacophony of noise and excitement. The program had been exactly what Rosemary needed – something that distracted her from everything that had happened over the last month. Her stomach hurt all day from her laughter as young kids swarmed the museum in their Halloween costumes.
As she hung up her coat, she caught something out of the corner of her eye on the kitchen table. Walking over, Rosemary immediately recognized Fern’s loopy handwriting.
Hey sweetie, probate hasn’t cleared yet, but I heard word it should within the month. Not to jinx it, but welcome to Saugatuck – its’ about time! I’m also including some keys to Robert’s safety deposit boxes for safekeeping. You can’t open them until the probate has cleared, so don’t get ahead of yourself! Love you, ae-in. Always. -F
“Oh, thank god.” She huffed as she opened the bulky envelope, dumping out various keys and paperwork, including the deed to the house and the store. She had an underlying fear that something would happen, and Robert’s wishes would have been overturned and she would get nothing. “Looks like we’re here for the time being, Baba!”
Rosemary read through the papers and picked up her phone to call Fern. For the next hour, the two women chatted about the changes, what she needed to do to register ownership with the state, and more. After they said their good-byes, Rosemary pulled her jacket on and patted Banana on the head as she left the house. It was dark now, but she knew the path through the cemetery and trudged up the hill towards Robert’s grave with no problem.
“You know, I’m certain you chose this spot for some reason or another, but I think it’s to punish me for not getting enough exercise.” She groused at the polished granite, wondering how she made this walk as often as she did, and it still robbed her of her breath. She was out of shape.
Robert’s cheeky grin beamed from the porcelain cameo embedded into the stone. She had never seen anything like it, but he had told her it was common among Eastern European communities. He described how they used this horribly unflattering photo for his aunt Ionna’s cameo and that he vowed he’d choose his own rather than leave it to his relatives to decide.
She sat down on the damp ground and settle in. She was still visiting the cemetery daily and while she didn’t cry as much as she had in the beginning, her throat always felt painful after she left. Wrapping the coat around her tightly she sighed.
“You missed our field trip day. I know you loved volunteering for it and the kids who remembered you from last year asked where you were.” She smiled. “I told them you were attending as a ghost and that they couldn’t see you. I think they believed me.
“I don’t know what strings you pulled up on that cloud of yours, but Fern thinks the probate will clear next month. I’m glad, this whole process has been a pain and thank you for not making me go through it. I’d give up and just die if Fern weren’t in charge. My landlord was mad I’m breaking my lease, but I know you’re excited, you always hated that place.” She sighed as a wave of sadness washed over her.
“I miss you.” Her voice crackled with tears. “I miss you so much, Robert! I hate that you’re gone. I hate that! I hate this! And I failed you! They still haven’t found the statue and I contacted the FBI and I haven’t heard anything, and I don’t know what to do!”
She cried harder, her ribs hurting as if the pain she experienced weeks ago was still fresh. She gripped her sides as she continued to sob. She was tired and everything that had happen in the month and a half since Robert died was catching up with her. Rosemary sat in the cold evening for hours and let her sadness out. When she finally left, the exhaustion she felt forced her straight to bed when she arrived at the house. In a bit of mercy, she slept a dreamless sleep for once.
—***—
“Good morning.” The deep voice caused Marquetta to turn from the display case she was working on. A tall man with brown hair and a kind smile stood at the front desk. She watched as Bob ambled over to welcome him. She couldn’t hear their conversation after that, but she kept a subtle watch on the interaction as the two men talked. The stranger smiled again and walked past her towards the stairs and she watched up trudge up each step until he was out of sight.
“You aren’t being very subtle.” Bob’s voice sounded behind her and Marquetta jumped at the noise. She felt herself grow hot, grateful her dark skin hid the blush rushing across her cheeks. She turned to look at Bob, who was grinning at her.
“Who was that?” She tried to keep her voice steady.
“Some FBI agent wanting to talk to Rosemary.”
“FBI?” Marquette frowned before her eyebrows shot up. “FBI! Oh my god! They’re here!”
“Don’t shout. It’s rude.”
“No, Bob! Rosemary reported that statue that got stolen to the FBI! That means they know about it! They’re here for that!”
“Does that mean they’ll find the men who hurt her?” He sounded hopeful at the idea. Even if he thought her manners were lacking, Bob was deeply upset that Rosemary had been hurt the way she had been. If this young agent can help find her attackers, he was all for it.
“I bet they do if they find the statue.” The two stopped talking when Rosemary and Banana entered the building. She looked up and felt awkward when she realized they were staring at her.
“Um, is something wrong?” She sounded unsure of herself and Bob got angry, realizing that these men didn’t just rob the museum of this ugly statue, it robbed Rosemary of her self-assurance.
“Never, Rose. There is an agent from the FBI in your office. Marquetta says you contacted them.” She startled, not believing that her reporting the stolen item would bring them to her front door. They were just a small history museum in Michigan, not the Detroit Institute of Art or the Smithsonian. She figured she’d get an email or a call, but never a real agent.
“They’re here? Really?” Her eyes lit up when Bob nodded. She started to laugh because she didn’t know what else to do. Marquetta walked over to hug her and the physical contact help to ground her.
“He’s good looking, too.” Marquetta whispered in her ear. Rosemary pulled back at the comment. “Like really good looking. His butt is cute.”
The two women giggled at the comment and hugged again. Picking up the leash she dropped, the curator and her furry companion went towards the stairs, hope beginning to bubble in her chest. Maybe she hadn’t failed Robert after all, she thought. When she reached the third floor, she stopped to catch her breath before walking down to her office.
When she stepped into the doorway, she saw him standing there, looking at her walls. She couldn’t see his face, but everything about his presence radiated kindness – something she hadn’t expected from an FBI agent. When he turned to look at her as she cleared her throat, his face lit up in a smile and she couldn’t help but smile back. For the first time in weeks, she felt safe.
“I’m Special Agent Marcus Pike.” He held out his hand to her. She took it with her customary firm grip.
Reminder: I ain’t ever seen Pedro Pascal in FUCK ALL, I’m just coming up with this as I go along, using imdb.com, wiki, and 84,000 tabs I got open to plan out this shit. I also write soft versions of his characters so if you’re craving asshole vibes, I ain’t got any but my own to offer.
Part 6 –Step Forward, Step Back, Find Your Partner Quick
Helen tried her best to console a distraught Rosemary as Officer Garcia spoke to several of his colleagues in the hallway. Her screams had startled the director, who was already on edge due to the break-in and if the circumstances had been different, the look of surprise and horror on the officer’s face would have reduced Helen to peals of laughter. But all the situation did was add worry to her shoulders.
For nearly two hours, the officers questioned Rosemary about the break-in, about the missing piece, and they kept asking if the museum had any enemies. As much as she wanted to say Fred Breyers out of pure spite, Rosemary kept her mouth shut – sure some people weren’t always pleased with some of their program or exhibit topics, but nothing that would result in the theft of an artifact or the physical beating of a staff member. The two women were exhausted by the time the three cops left the building. Rosemary laid on the couch in her office, a wet cloth over her eyes as the lingering headache from the attack ramped up under this new stress.
“Rose, are you going to be okay?” Helen’s voice was soft, but unable to keep the worried tone at bay.
“I honestly don’t know. That statue was the only thing missing. I don’t know if I’m upset because I promised Robert we’d care for it or mad as hell that accepting that ugly ass hunk of bronze led to all of this and possibly hurt the museum’s reputation.” She sighed heavily, the now cool cloth doing little to help her. She slowly sat up, swinging her legs over the sofa’s edge.
“I wouldn’t worry about our reputation. I’m already working with Marquetta on a press release to get ahead of the game. Louis over at the Caller always does right by us, I’ll give him the scoop first and he’ll spin it in our favor.” Helen leaned back. “I’ll also call major donors today to inform them of the situation.”
“I’m sorry, Helen. I never thought this would have happened!” The younger woman groaned heavily as she tried to stand, but the director held out her hand to keep her from getting up. The body stilled.
“Did Francois’ report show anything differently than what Robert had given you?” Before Robert’s health worsened, Rosemary contacted an old friend of hers to appraise the piece as Helen wanted a second opinion for the insurance company. The in-depth discussion about the findings with Helen was moved back first by Robert’s death and then the attack. “Are we still looking at the same value?”
“I reread it the day before the attack to prep for the meeting that never obviously happened, and he seems to agree with the assessment Robert gave us. The statue was processed into the collections several months ago and I put in Robert’s information, but never got around to putting in Francois’ report.”
“Well, so long as the original value was imputed into the report, it’ll give us something for the insurance company.”
“Are we going to report it lost? What if they recover it?”
“Rose, I don’t mean to sound mean, but I doubt these officers are going to find the piece. Whoever has it is probably long gone by now.” Helen glanced over at her. “Unless a miracle happens.”
“Well good thing I believe in manifestation and miracles.” For the first time in what seemed like a long while, Rosemary smiled as her old humor began to shine through. The director smiled back, unable to let the infectious comment not affect her.
“We’ll see.”
—***—
Two Weeks Later
“Pike! Get in here!” Carmichael’s voice carried through the small cluster of offices their department occupied. “Pike!”
“I’m coming! Damn, give me a second!” Pike grumbled as he scurried from his office and across to hers. She wasn’t a loud person, so the excited shout she gave had everyone around her curious. As Pike entered the room, he could see his partner standing behind her desk, doing a little hop-dance. He raised an eyebrow.
“You need to look at this!” She pointed at the computer, her smile so big it nearly took over her face. He stopped because she was giggling, Carmichael never giggled. Whatever this was, it had to been good. Pike came around the desk and bent down to see what she was looking at and when his eyes landed on the screen, his eyes bugged out and his jaw dropped.
“This is one of them, isn’t it?” Carmichael asked, her voice quivering in excitement. He ran out of the office to the command center for the cold cases, his presence startling his crew. He looked over at the evidence board and ripped off a picture hanging in the middle before rifling through one of the boxes to find the corresponding file. He ran back to the office.
The picture in his hand was faded with time, that grainy look of age that pictures older pictures were taking on, but despite those flaws, the sculpture in the photo matched the one in the new alert in the NSAF database. The Cornucopia had always been breathtaking.
And it’s been missing since 1993.
The agents glanced over the dossier, reviewing the piece to try and discover how this priceless Russian artifact made its way to what looks like a small museum in Western Michigan. Neither had reviewed the original case file closely and both felt their jaws dropping as they read further and further into its history:
A rare example of the early Ukrainian Avant Garde art movement, The Cornucopia was created by Artem Chumak, a well-known artist from Odessa. Commissioned by the then-governor of the country as a gift to Czar Nicolas II in 1907, the piece was designed to showcase the entirety of the Ukraine in a single moment. Because the country was known for its agriculture, Chumak chose to use the image of the cornucopia as his inspiration.
The piece is made of bronze and inlaid with the following precious gemstones:
Siberian diamond
Ural sapphire
Ural ruby
Ural jade
Russian emerald
Russian opal
Ukrainian pearl
Upon the fall of the Russian empire in 1917, Dowager Empress Maria Feodorovna Romanov took the piece along with several others from the royal art collection when she fled Russia. She remained owner of the piece until 1920, when she sold it to the Grand Duke of Luxembourg.
In turn, the Grand Duke loaned the piece to the National Museum of History and Art and it remained with the museum until the outbreak of World War II. The ducal family took the piece back, along with several others to protect the collection from the advancement of the Nazis.
Unfortunately, the move did little good and much of the museum’s collection, including the pieces stored in the ducal family home, were taken by the Nazis, with intention of destroying them as part of the Germanization of the annexed country.
The pieces remained missing until 1949, when a team from the Monuments, Fine Arts, and Archives program (a.k.a. the Monument Men), recovered the stolen collections in a cellar in Hamburg and returned them to their respective homes. The Cornucopia was returned to the museum and was on display until the ducal family attempted to sell the piece in 1965. The sale failed and the family remained owners until the piece was loaned to the Luxembourg-American Cultural Museum in the U.S. in 1992.
In 1993, the piece was stolen from the museum and reported to the FBI’s Art Theft Squad days later. The piece has yet to be recovered despite the best attempts of the team.
Pike looked at Carmichael and they grinned at each other. While it being reported as missing didn’t mean that they had found it, it did mean that this cold case was heating up.
“Do you think we found our key?” He didn’t want to sound hopeful, but he had to admit he was optimistic that they were much closer to solving this case. The evidence they had been sifting through meticulously was painting a picture, but like a jigsaw puzzle, they were still missing pieces that brought it all together.
“I think we have.” Carmichael replied. They grinned at each other.
“Whose turn is it to go and do the interview?”
“Mine, but could you do it? Marty is out of town on business this week and I can’t leave Dinah alone.” She rarely asked to trade like this, but Pike held up his hands in understanding. They smiled, grateful they were partnered up, their work relationship had always been a smooth one.
“Sure, what could possibly happen in Michigan?”
They laughed as they started to walk to the command center.
—***—
Rosemary and Banana walked into the house, both exhausted from the day, the museum’s annual fall field trip event a cacophony of noise and excitement. The program had been exactly what Rosemary needed – something that distracted her from everything that had happened over the last month. Her stomach hurt all day from her laughter as young kids swarmed the museum in their Halloween costumes.
As she hung up her coat, she caught something out of the corner of her eye on the kitchen table. Walking over, Rosemary immediately recognized Fern’s loopy handwriting.
Hey sweetie, probate hasn’t cleared yet, but I heard word it should within the month. Not to jinx it, but welcome to Saugatuck – its’ about time! I’m also including some keys to Robert’s safety deposit boxes for safekeeping. You can’t open them until the probate has cleared, so don’t get ahead of yourself! Love you, ae-in. Always. -F
“Oh, thank god.” She huffed as she opened the bulky envelope, dumping out various keys and paperwork, including the deed to the house and the store. She had an underlying fear that something would happen, and Robert’s wishes would have been overturned and she would get nothing. “Looks like we’re here for the time being, Baba!”
Rosemary read through the papers and picked up her phone to call Fern. For the next hour, the two women chatted about the changes, what she needed to do to register ownership with the state, and more. After they said their good-byes, Rosemary pulled her jacket on and patted Banana on the head as she left the house. It was dark now, but she knew the path through the cemetery and trudged up the hill towards Robert’s grave with no problem.
“You know, I’m certain you chose this spot for some reason or another, but I think it’s to punish me for not getting enough exercise.” She groused at the polished granite, wondering how she made this walk as often as she did, and it still robbed her of her breath. She was out of shape.
Robert’s cheeky grin beamed from the porcelain cameo embedded into the stone. She had never seen anything like it, but he had told her it was common among Eastern European communities. He described how they used this horribly unflattering photo for his aunt Ionna’s cameo and that he vowed he’d choose his own rather than leave it to his relatives to decide.
She sat down on the damp ground and settle in. She was still visiting the cemetery daily and while she didn’t cry as much as she had in the beginning, her throat always felt painful after she left. Wrapping the coat around her tightly she sighed.
“You missed our field trip day. I know you loved volunteering for it and the kids who remembered you from last year asked where you were.” She smiled. “I told them you were attending as a ghost and that they couldn’t see you. I think they believed me.
“I don’t know what strings you pulled up on that cloud of yours, but Fern thinks the probate will clear next month. I’m glad, this whole process has been a pain and thank you for not making me go through it. I’d give up and just die if Fern weren’t in charge. My landlord was mad I’m breaking my lease, but I know you’re excited, you always hated that place.” She sighed as a wave of sadness washed over her.
“I miss you.” Her voice crackled with tears. “I miss you so much, Robert! I hate that you’re gone. I hate that! I hate this! And I failed you! They still haven’t found the statue and I contacted the FBI and I haven’t heard anything, and I don’t know what to do!”
She cried harder, her ribs hurting as if the pain she experienced weeks ago was still fresh. She gripped her sides as she continued to sob. She was tired and everything that had happen in the month and a half since Robert died was catching up with her. Rosemary sat in the cold evening for hours and let her sadness out. When she finally left, the exhaustion she felt forced her straight to bed when she arrived at the house. In a bit of mercy, she slept a dreamless sleep for once.
—***—
“Good morning.” The deep voice caused Marquetta to turn from the display case she was working on. A tall man with brown hair and a kind smile stood at the front desk. She watched as Bob ambled over to welcome him. She couldn’t hear their conversation after that, but she kept a subtle watch on the interaction as the two men talked. The stranger smiled again and walked past her towards the stairs and she watched up trudge up each step until he was out of sight.
“You aren’t being very subtle.” Bob’s voice sounded behind her and Marquetta jumped at the noise. She felt herself grow hot, grateful her dark skin hid the blush rushing across her cheeks. She turned to look at Bob, who was grinning at her.
“Who was that?” She tried to keep her voice steady.
“Some FBI agent wanting to talk to Rosemary.”
“FBI?” Marquette frowned before her eyebrows shot up. “FBI! Oh my god! They’re here!”
“Don’t shout. It’s rude.”
“No, Bob! Rosemary reported that statue that got stolen to the FBI! That means they know about it! They’re here for that!”
“Does that mean they’ll find the men who hurt her?” He sounded hopeful at the idea. Even if he thought her manners were lacking, Bob was deeply upset that Rosemary had been hurt the way she had been. If this young agent can help find her attackers, he was all for it.
“I bet they do if they find the statue.” The two stopped talking when Rosemary and Banana entered the building. She looked up and felt awkward when she realized they were staring at her.
“Um, is something wrong?” She sounded unsure of herself and Bob got angry, realizing that these men didn’t just rob the museum of this ugly statue, it robbed Rosemary of her self-assurance.
“Never, Rose. There is an agent from the FBI in your office. Marquetta says you contacted them.” She startled, not believing that her reporting the stolen item would bring them to her front door. They were just a small history museum in Michigan, not the Detroit Institute of Art or the Smithsonian. She figured she’d get an email or a call, but never a real agent.
“They’re here? Really?” Her eyes lit up when Bob nodded. She started to laugh because she didn’t know what else to do. Marquetta walked over to hug her and the physical contact help to ground her.
“He’s good looking, too.” Marquetta whispered in her ear. Rosemary pulled back at the comment. “Like really good looking. His butt is cute.”
The two women giggled at the comment and hugged again. Picking up the leash she dropped, the curator and her furry companion went towards the stairs, hope beginning to bubble in her chest. Maybe she hadn’t failed Robert after all, she thought. When she reached the third floor, she stopped to catch her breath before walking down to her office.
When she stepped into the doorway, she saw him standing there, looking at her walls. She couldn’t see his face, but everything about his presence radiated kindness – something she hadn’t expected from an FBI agent. When he turned to look at her as she cleared her throat, his face lit up in a smile and she couldn’t help but smile back. For the first time in weeks, she felt safe.
“I’m Special Agent Marcus Pike.” He held out his hand to her. She took it with her customary firm grip.
A/N: I’m back on my Monument Woman bullshit, but thanks for the Smile love!
Reminder: I ain’t ever seen Pedro Pascal in FUCK ALL, I’m just coming up with this as I go along, using imdb.com, wiki, and 84,000 tabs I got open to plan out this shit. I also write soft versions of his characters so if you’re craving asshole vibes, I ain’t got any but my own to offer.
Rosemary sat at the kitchen table, reviewing the documents in front of her as Banana curled up awkwardly in her lap. His light snores were the only sounds that could be heard in the bright kitchen besides the shuffling of papers that Fern had brought to her earlier that afternoon.
Robert left everything to Rosemary and now she had a home and business to contend with, knowing that her hands were tied until the probate cleared. Thankfully, Robert had made Fern the executor of his estate, knowing that Rosemary wouldn’t be in the best of places to handle so much information. But there were still papers to initial and checks to sign for the store in the meantime.
Just a few days before, she had walked down Hoffman Street to visit Fern’s office and passed by Jak Spravy Books. She and Robert had closed the store in August as his health worsened. She felt her heart cheer up a little at all the flowers and mementos left by people in the community. Robert had been well loved.
“Ow, Baba!” Rosemary cried out as the dog suddenly shifted, stepping heavily in the crease of her thigh. The dog whined at her sudden movements before jumping down and padding into the living room, on the hunt for a bed that didn’t move. Shaking her head, she went back to the folder, initialing where Fern had marked in the paperwork.
Sighing as she closed the folder, she stretched her arms out and let out a groan when her shoulder popped. Rosemary stood up, letting her lower back crack as well. The late afternoon sun was starting to pour into the kitchen, illuminating a life well lived. She wandered towards the living room herself to watch the dog snooze before she felt the itch to get out of the house.
Robert’s house – no, her house now – was situated a couple blocks from the cemetery where he was buried, and she grabbed her keys off the hook before locking the door as she left. The early October air was brisk as she wrapped her jacket around herself, and it smelled deeply of autumn. She crunched through the leaves on the sidewalk and thought absent mindedly that she should hire the teenager across the street to rake the yard. The walk was a short one and soon she found herself standing in front of his gravestone.
“Hi.” Her voice sounded small. “You’re probably rolling your eyes at me now, not believing I’m back again.”
She chuckled as she sat down, getting comfortable against the stone. She’d been to the cemetery every day since they buried him the week before and she found herself spending at least an hour just talking out loud. Sometimes she cried, but mostly she poured out her heart, telling his stone her fears about the future, her loneliness, her gratitude that he had been so generous.
The sun was low in the sky and the cemetery was shrouded in the hazy purple of dusk when she finally made her way back to the house. She saw cars in the driveway as she came up the street and began to jog, realizing her friends had arrived. None of the women had left her alone since he passed, and Rosemary was grateful to have such loving people in her life.
The night Robert died, she said she was alone now. But now that the shock of death had passed, she realized that was wrong. She wasn’t alone so long as her girls were with her. She bounced up the stairs with a spring that had been missing since Robert told her he was dying and opened the door. The bright light of the kitchen and the warm smells of a hearty dinner enveloped her as tightly as the three pairs of arms did.
No, she thought, I am not alone at all.
-*-
Eventually Rosemary returned to work, warmly welcomed by the rest of the staff – even Bob. Walking into her workstation, she gave Marquetta a long hug, which was heartily returned. Their staff was a small one and Marquetta had become a treasured work friend and the curator worked hard to mentor the young woman.
“I have two tours today, but if you need me, come find me.” Marquetta leaned back and flashed her million-watt grin at Rosemary, who nodded. As she left the room, she squatted down to give Banana a pet on the head and in return she received a happy doggy grin.
“Good luck with the little beesters, M!” Rosemary called down the hall to a ‘yeah yeah.’ She shook her head as she looked around to figure out what was her next project. Noticing the large pile on her previously empty ‘To Be Accessioned’ shelf, she sighed heavily and rolled up her sleeves to get to work.
-*-
Music played quietly in the background as Rosemary continued to work into the late evening. Everyone else had left hours ago, but she had been on such a roll that she couldn’t stop. She hummed along with the song absent-mindedly as she carefully stuffed the sleeve of the fragile dress that had been donated while she was gone. The satin had already frayed at the seam and she held her breath as her arm entered the sleeve.
The breath she let out was tinged with glee as she realized no further damage had been done to the beautiful piece. Bouncing on the balls of her feet, she reached over and grabbed another sheet of tissue paper to start the process all over again in the other sleeve. Just as she began to roll up the flimsy paper, Banana suddenly growled. Rosemary startled at the sound.
The dog never growled.
“Baba?” Her voice was cautious. “What is it?”
The dog suddenly barked and before she could react a sharp pain radiated through her skull. The force of the hit knocked her into the work bench before she bounced off the wooden surface to the floor. The ringing in her ears nearly muffled the voices talking above her. Why did everything feel like she was mired in molasses? Shaking her head, Rosemary tried to move to her hands and knees when a steel-toed boot connected with her ribs. The air rushed out of her lungs along with a shattered cry.
Banana barked again, baring his teeth at the intruders, but cowered under the table when another boot swung at him. He whimpered, looking from the two hulking shapes that had entered the room to Rosemary, who squirmed on the floor.
“Where is it?” The voice was distorted from the growing headache and all Rosemary could do was groan. A hand reached out and slapped her. “I asked you, where is it?”
Another voice wormed its way into her addled brain, but for some reason she couldn’t understand it, as if the speaker were talking in a foreign tongue. The nausea that she had been fighting was winning and she could feel the bile rise in her throat. She rolled to her side, hoping to stem the tide, but a hand reached out and yanked her head back. Her groan sounded wet and the voices argued again in that tongue she couldn’t identify.
She heard crashing and something breaking above her head and she tried to protest, to protect the artifacts she had been processing. She reached her hand out and felt a sharp pain as glass sliced her palm. Crying out, the attackers must have heard her and looked down. A heavy boot slammed down onto her arm, pinning her into place.
“It must be in here, she got it before she left. Find it, I want it!” A third voice floated into the mix and Rosemary raised her head slightly, feeling as if what she heard was familiar. The boot on her arm moved and a sharp pain radiated through her skull as she was kicked again. Rolling onto her back, she could feel something wet underneath her and as the darkness enveloped her, she wondered if she would wake up again.
—***—
“Mrs. Morgan, I need for you to please take a deep breath. I need your help.” The young officer had kind eyes as she held onto Helen’s hand. The director was shaking like a leaf, face streaked with tears as she watched them carry Rosemary out of the building.
Nothing was out of place when she entered the museum that morning, noting that Rosemary’s car was in the lot. She shook her head, hoping the curator wasn’t overworking herself to get through the grief of losing Robert. Helen went up the stairs as she usually did, responding to a text message from her son. When she got to the top floor, she smiled as she heard the music and took a left turn towards Rosemary’s workroom.
She isn’t sure how she found the ability to call the police, her shock at the devastating scene in front of her rendering her as still as a statue. At the sight of her, Banana stood up from his spot next to Rosemary and sprinted towards the familiar face. The room looked as if a tornado hit it – items torn or broken, supplies tossed everywhere, an entire shelf knocked over, and one of the cabinets was wrenched open. And in the center of it all was Rosemary, lying on the floor - unconscious or dead, Helen wasn’t sure.
“I’m sorry, I’m sorry. Let me try again.” Helen took a deep breath as requested and recounted everything she had witness before the police arrived. Marquetta and Bob had shown up shortly before the police did and they stood off to the side in silence, a mournful looking dog in the young woman’s arms. They watched as the paramedics left the building and Marquetta buried her face into Banana’s warm neck. Bob laid a gentle hand on her shoulder and squeezed, tears prickling his eyes at the scene before him.
After promising the police not to touch upstairs until they were done, the three museum employees quietly decided to keep the place close for the day. Not wanting to be alone, they walked down the street to a small diner, one they knew would let Banana in. They weren’t hungry, but they didn’t want to be alone.
Who could have done this and why?
—***—
“Fuck.” The word sounded scratchy and raw as it tumbled from Rosemary’s mouth. Fern and Amy sat up immediately, relieved that she was finally awake. The bright lights seemed to burn her eyes as she slowly opened them but attempts to move her hand seemed difficult as if it weighed a ton. “What the fuck?”
“That would be your first word after being knocked out.” Tina let out a chuckle as she entered the room with three cups of coffee. Amy reached out to touch Rosemary’s forehead while Fern left the room to find a nurse. “How you feeling, Muhammad Ali?”
“You’re not funny, bitch.” Rosemary mumbled and Tina let out a louder laugh.
“I’d say you’re no worse for the wear with that response.” Amy looked over at Tina, who raised her hands. The sound of heavy footsteps came closer and the doctor entered the room with Fern in tow. The two other women raised their eyebrows at the man standing before them, his slight stature not what they were expecting from all the noise they had just heard.
“Ms. Park here says Rosemary’s awake and by the sounds of Ms. Steinberger, already on her way to the Cracker Jack Club.” Dr. Westen smiled broadly, his eyes crinkling in the corner as he watched Rosemary attempt to give a withering glare in his direction.
“You’re not funny, either.”
“I know, but my husband would argue otherwise. Now, on a scale from ‘eh its fine’ to ‘I want to die,’ how bad is your pain right now?” He pulled at her eyelid, shining a light into her eyes. She groaned loudly and tried to swat away his hands.
“Stop, the light makes my head hurt.” He stood up, nodding
“Well that may be, but your eyes are reacting normally, and I’d say your concussion won’t leave much lasting damage. But you’re going to have a gnarly headache for a few days. Can you wiggle your fingers and toes?” She complied and he grinned again. “I want you to stay one more night just for observation, but I say you can go home tomorrow with no problems. I’ll write a script for you for the pain.”
After chatting further with the three other women, the kind doctor took his leave and Rosemary’s friends turned to look directly at her, their eyebrows drawn in frustration. She knew that look and weakly held her hands up.
“I’m just waking up, don’t jump on my ass yet.” She sighed. “What do I have to do to get some water around here?”
-*-
Three days later, Rosemary rode the elevator at work, ever grateful for its existence. The idea of walking up three flights of stairs made her headache seem worse. She closed her eyes and sighed, leaning her head against the wall of the car, trying to ignore Officer Garcia, who was riding up with her to the third floor. She knew they were waiting on her to give her statement, but she feared what she was going to find. The sounds of breaking glass and metal on metal still echoed in her head.
She slowly walked down the hall, a steady hand at her elbow from her new companion and she smiled as she saw Baba waiting for her outside her workshop. The dog ambled up to her, having stayed with Marquetta while Rosemary was in the hospital. She swayed a bit as she bent down to pet him and when she stood up, she felt nauseous at the dizzy sensation swirling in her head.
“I promise we’ll make this quick,” Officer Garcia sighed in concern as he felt Rosemary’s hand grip his hard. “I know that this will be difficult, but the sooner we know what happened and what’s missing, the faster we can solve this crime.”
She nodded and they continued down the hall. She gasped when she saw the room, realizing it looked worse than she feared. Shuffling into the space, she started to tear up at the box of Austrian crystal that had been donated by Mrs. Heard, a beautiful set that was planned for one of their exhibits. With the help of the officer, she bent down, shifting the box to see if anything was salvageable. It was hard to focus and she righted the box, hoping to come back to it later.
When her eyes landed on the workbench and saw the dress she had been processing was still there, she heaved a sigh of relief. She could see small spatters of blood, but she brushed it off, knowing they could remove it carefully. She made a mental note to sit down with Marquetta before she left to list what needed to be done. Until the headaches went away, Rosemary was useless in this space.
Officer Garcia dutifully took notes as the curator slowly walked through the space, noting that nothing seemed to be gone. She’d have to check the records though, she pointed out to him and he nodded in return. As she turned around, her eyes landed on her cabinet and she stood still, ears ringing for a completely different reason.
Someone had ripped open the cabinet, the metal doors hanging off their hinges and rendered into hunks of nothing. Rosemary stumbled forward with a cry, noticing it was completely empty. She began to say ‘no’ over and over until Officer Garcia placed his hand on her shoulder. She turned around; her face twisted in panic.
A/N: I’m back on my Monument Woman bullshit, but thanks for the Smile love!
Reminder: I ain’t ever seen Pedro Pascal in FUCK ALL, I’m just coming up with this as I go along, using imdb.com, wiki, and 84,000 tabs I got open to plan out this shit. I also write soft versions of his characters so if you’re craving asshole vibes, I ain’t got any but my own to offer.
Rosemary sat at the kitchen table, reviewing the documents in front of her as Banana curled up awkwardly in her lap. His light snores were the only sounds that could be heard in the bright kitchen besides the shuffling of papers that Fern had brought to her earlier that afternoon.
Robert left everything to Rosemary and now she had a home and business to contend with, knowing that her hands were tied until the probate cleared. Thankfully, Robert had made Fern the executor of his estate, knowing that Rosemary wouldn’t be in the best of places to handle so much information. But there were still papers to initial and checks to sign for the store in the meantime.
Just a few days before, she had walked down Hoffman Street to visit Fern’s office and passed by Jak Spravy Books. She and Robert had closed the store in August as his health worsened. She felt her heart cheer up a little at all the flowers and mementos left by people in the community. Robert had been well loved.
“Ow, Baba!” Rosemary cried out as the dog suddenly shifted, stepping heavily in the crease of her thigh. The dog whined at her sudden movements before jumping down and padding into the living room, on the hunt for a bed that didn’t move. Shaking her head, she went back to the folder, initialing where Fern had marked in the paperwork.
Sighing as she closed the folder, she stretched her arms out and let out a groan when her shoulder popped. Rosemary stood up, letting her lower back crack as well. The late afternoon sun was starting to pour into the kitchen, illuminating a life well lived. She wandered towards the living room herself to watch the dog snooze before she felt the itch to get out of the house.
Robert’s house – no, her house now – was situated a couple blocks from the cemetery where he was buried, and she grabbed her keys off the hook before locking the door as she left. The early October air was brisk as she wrapped her jacket around herself, and it smelled deeply of autumn. She crunched through the leaves on the sidewalk and thought absent mindedly that she should hire the teenager across the street to rake the yard. The walk was a short one and soon she found herself standing in front of his gravestone.
“Hi.” Her voice sounded small. “You’re probably rolling your eyes at me now, not believing I’m back again.”
She chuckled as she sat down, getting comfortable against the stone. She’d been to the cemetery every day since they buried him the week before and she found herself spending at least an hour just talking out loud. Sometimes she cried, but mostly she poured out her heart, telling his stone her fears about the future, her loneliness, her gratitude that he had been so generous.
The sun was low in the sky and the cemetery was shrouded in the hazy purple of dusk when she finally made her way back to the house. She saw cars in the driveway as she came up the street and began to jog, realizing her friends had arrived. None of the women had left her alone since he passed, and Rosemary was grateful to have such loving people in her life.
The night Robert died, she said she was alone now. But now that the shock of death had passed, she realized that was wrong. She wasn’t alone so long as her girls were with her. She bounced up the stairs with a spring that had been missing since Robert told her he was dying and opened the door. The bright light of the kitchen and the warm smells of a hearty dinner enveloped her as tightly as the three pairs of arms did.
No, she thought, I am not alone at all.
-*-
Eventually Rosemary returned to work, warmly welcomed by the rest of the staff – even Bob. Walking into her workstation, she gave Marquetta a long hug, which was heartily returned. Their staff was a small one and Marquetta had become a treasured work friend and the curator worked hard to mentor the young woman.
“I have two tours today, but if you need me, come find me.” Marquetta leaned back and flashed her million-watt grin at Rosemary, who nodded. As she left the room, she squatted down to give Banana a pet on the head and in return she received a happy doggy grin.
“Good luck with the little beesters, M!” Rosemary called down the hall to a ‘yeah yeah.’ She shook her head as she looked around to figure out what was her next project. Noticing the large pile on her previously empty ‘To Be Accessioned’ shelf, she sighed heavily and rolled up her sleeves to get to work.
-*-
Music played quietly in the background as Rosemary continued to work into the late evening. Everyone else had left hours ago, but she had been on such a roll that she couldn’t stop. She hummed along with the song absent-mindedly as she carefully stuffed the sleeve of the fragile dress that had been donated while she was gone. The satin had already frayed at the seam and she held her breath as her arm entered the sleeve.
The breath she let out was tinged with glee as she realized no further damage had been done to the beautiful piece. Bouncing on the balls of her feet, she reached over and grabbed another sheet of tissue paper to start the process all over again in the other sleeve. Just as she began to roll up the flimsy paper, Banana suddenly growled. Rosemary startled at the sound.
The dog never growled.
“Baba?” Her voice was cautious. “What is it?”
The dog suddenly barked and before she could react a sharp pain radiated through her skull. The force of the hit knocked her into the work bench before she bounced off the wooden surface to the floor. The ringing in her ears nearly muffled the voices talking above her. Why did everything feel like she was mired in molasses? Shaking her head, Rosemary tried to move to her hands and knees when a steel-toed boot connected with her ribs. The air rushed out of her lungs along with a shattered cry.
Banana barked again, baring his teeth at the intruders, but cowered under the table when another boot swung at him. He whimpered, looking from the two hulking shapes that had entered the room to Rosemary, who squirmed on the floor.
“Where is it?” The voice was distorted from the growing headache and all Rosemary could do was groan. A hand reached out and slapped her. “I asked you, where is it?”
Another voice wormed its way into her addled brain, but for some reason she couldn’t understand it, as if the speaker were talking in a foreign tongue. The nausea that she had been fighting was winning and she could feel the bile rise in her throat. She rolled to her side, hoping to stem the tide, but a hand reached out and yanked her head back. Her groan sounded wet and the voices argued again in that tongue she couldn’t identify.
She heard crashing and something breaking above her head and she tried to protest, to protect the artifacts she had been processing. She reached her hand out and felt a sharp pain as glass sliced her palm. Crying out, the attackers must have heard her and looked down. A heavy boot slammed down onto her arm, pinning her into place.
“It must be in here, she got it before she left. Find it, I want it!” A third voice floated into the mix and Rosemary raised her head slightly, feeling as if what she heard was familiar. The boot on her arm moved and a sharp pain radiated through her skull as she was kicked again. Rolling onto her back, she could feel something wet underneath her and as the darkness enveloped her, she wondered if she would wake up again.
—***—
“Mrs. Morgan, I need for you to please take a deep breath. I need your help.” The young officer had kind eyes as she held onto Helen’s hand. The director was shaking like a leaf, face streaked with tears as she watched them carry Rosemary out of the building.
Nothing was out of place when she entered the museum that morning, noting that Rosemary’s car was in the lot. She shook her head, hoping the curator wasn’t overworking herself to get through the grief of losing Robert. Helen went up the stairs as she usually did, responding to a text message from her son. When she got to the top floor, she smiled as she heard the music and took a left turn towards Rosemary’s workroom.
She isn’t sure how she found the ability to call the police, her shock at the devastating scene in front of her rendering her as still as a statue. At the sight of her, Banana stood up from his spot next to Rosemary and sprinted towards the familiar face. The room looked as if a tornado hit it – items torn or broken, supplies tossed everywhere, an entire shelf knocked over, and one of the cabinets was wrenched open. And in the center of it all was Rosemary, lying on the floor - unconscious or dead, Helen wasn’t sure.
“I’m sorry, I’m sorry. Let me try again.” Helen took a deep breath as requested and recounted everything she had witness before the police arrived. Marquetta and Bob had shown up shortly before the police did and they stood off to the side in silence, a mournful looking dog in the young woman’s arms. They watched as the paramedics left the building and Marquetta buried her face into Banana’s warm neck. Bob laid a gentle hand on her shoulder and squeezed, tears prickling his eyes at the scene before him.
After promising the police not to touch upstairs until they were done, the three museum employees quietly decided to keep the place close for the day. Not wanting to be alone, they walked down the street to a small diner, one they knew would let Banana in. They weren’t hungry, but they didn’t want to be alone.
Who could have done this and why?
—***—
“Fuck.” The word sounded scratchy and raw as it tumbled from Rosemary’s mouth. Fern and Amy sat up immediately, relieved that she was finally awake. The bright lights seemed to burn her eyes as she slowly opened them but attempts to move her hand seemed difficult as if it weighed a ton. “What the fuck?”
“That would be your first word after being knocked out.” Tina let out a chuckle as she entered the room with three cups of coffee. Amy reached out to touch Rosemary’s forehead while Fern left the room to find a nurse. “How you feeling, Muhammad Ali?”
“You’re not funny, bitch.” Rosemary mumbled and Tina let out a louder laugh.
“I’d say you’re no worse for the wear with that response.” Amy looked over at Tina, who raised her hands. The sound of heavy footsteps came closer and the doctor entered the room with Fern in tow. The two other women raised their eyebrows at the man standing before them, his slight stature not what they were expecting from all the noise they had just heard.
“Ms. Park here says Rosemary’s awake and by the sounds of Ms. Steinberger, already on her way to the Cracker Jack Club.” Dr. Westen smiled broadly, his eyes crinkling in the corner as he watched Rosemary attempt to give a withering glare in his direction.
“You’re not funny, either.”
“I know, but my husband would argue otherwise. Now, on a scale from ‘eh its fine’ to ‘I want to die,’ how bad is your pain right now?” He pulled at her eyelid, shining a light into her eyes. She groaned loudly and tried to swat away his hands.
“Stop, the light makes my head hurt.” He stood up, nodding
“Well that may be, but your eyes are reacting normally, and I’d say your concussion won’t leave much lasting damage. But you’re going to have a gnarly headache for a few days. Can you wiggle your fingers and toes?” She complied and he grinned again. “I want you to stay one more night just for observation, but I say you can go home tomorrow with no problems. I’ll write a script for you for the pain.”
After chatting further with the three other women, the kind doctor took his leave and Rosemary’s friends turned to look directly at her, their eyebrows drawn in frustration. She knew that look and weakly held her hands up.
“I’m just waking up, don’t jump on my ass yet.” She sighed. “What do I have to do to get some water around here?”
-*-
Three days later, Rosemary rode the elevator at work, ever grateful for its existence. The idea of walking up three flights of stairs made her headache seem worse. She closed her eyes and sighed, leaning her head against the wall of the car, trying to ignore Officer Garcia, who was riding up with her to the third floor. She knew they were waiting on her to give her statement, but she feared what she was going to find. The sounds of breaking glass and metal on metal still echoed in her head.
She slowly walked down the hall, a steady hand at her elbow from her new companion and she smiled as she saw Baba waiting for her outside her workshop. The dog ambled up to her, having stayed with Marquetta while Rosemary was in the hospital. She swayed a bit as she bent down to pet him and when she stood up, she felt nauseous at the dizzy sensation swirling in her head.
“I promise we’ll make this quick,” Officer Garcia sighed in concern as he felt Rosemary’s hand grip his hard. “I know that this will be difficult, but the sooner we know what happened and what’s missing, the faster we can solve this crime.”
She nodded and they continued down the hall. She gasped when she saw the room, realizing it looked worse than she feared. Shuffling into the space, she started to tear up at the box of Austrian crystal that had been donated by Mrs. Heard, a beautiful set that was planned for one of their exhibits. With the help of the officer, she bent down, shifting the box to see if anything was salvageable. It was hard to focus and she righted the box, hoping to come back to it later.
When her eyes landed on the workbench and saw the dress she had been processing was still there, she heaved a sigh of relief. She could see small spatters of blood, but she brushed it off, knowing they could remove it carefully. She made a mental note to sit down with Marquetta before she left to list what needed to be done. Until the headaches went away, Rosemary was useless in this space.
Officer Garcia dutifully took notes as the curator slowly walked through the space, noting that nothing seemed to be gone. She’d have to check the records though, she pointed out to him and he nodded in return. As she turned around, her eyes landed on her cabinet and she stood still, ears ringing for a completely different reason.
Someone had ripped open the cabinet, the metal doors hanging off their hinges and rendered into hunks of nothing. Rosemary stumbled forward with a cry, noticing it was completely empty. She began to say ‘no’ over and over until Officer Garcia placed his hand on her shoulder. She turned around; her face twisted in panic.
A/N:I pounded this bad boy out in 30 minutes, that’s how badly the idea needed to be written.
Reminder:I ain’t ever seen Pedro Pascal in FUCK ALL, I’m just coming up with this as I go along, using imdb.com, wiki, and 84,000 tabs I got open to plan out this shit. I also write soft versions of his characters so if you’re craving asshole vibes, I ain’t got any but my own to offer.
“What’s that smile for, you silly man?” You cock your head towards Marcus as he lays in bed, watching you finish toweling off from your shower. He slowly shakes his head.
“Nothing.”
“Hmm, I doubt that, Mr. Pike.” He continues to smile as you toss your towel on the arm of the reading chair, your nudity on full display for him and somehow that grin of his gets impossibly larger. You slowly walk towards him, feeling his eyes rake across your body, still flush from the hot shower you took.
You reach the edge of the bed and begin to crawl across it until your right next to him. You bend your head down to pepper soft kisses along his bare shoulder and you internally grin as you felt his muscles bunch and jump beneath your touch. You remain on all fours but lower your upper half so that you rest on your elbows, nipples tightening as your breasts sway against the soft sheets.
“Hello.” You brush your lips against his, letting the velvet skin send a shiver down your spine.
“Hello.” He kisses you back, his tongue begging entrance into your mouth and the shivers grow as you open to him. With your ass and core tilted upwards, you can feel the coolness of the room more intently as you began to get wetter.
You continue to kiss for long minutes and you’re so focused on the sensation of his lips and tongue against your mouth, you fail to notice that he has snaked his arm underneath you. Suddenly his thick fingers cup your mound and you rear back, gasping in pleasure and surprise. He continues to smile, a lazy tinge to it as his eyes drop to half-mast in pleasure.
He runs two fingers between the lips of your core, rubbing gently as he passes over your clit and you moan in pleasure, thighs wanting to clasp together. You drop your face to press it into his shoulder and your hands begin to grasp the sheets beneath you to anchor yourself against the onslaught of pleasure.
Marcus slows his ministrations and your hips jerk, seeking the friction he denies you. Suddenly, his fingers return to your clit and begin to rub in agonizingly slow circles. You gasp harshly against his skin and the moan you let out seems so loud. Your body trembles as the pleasure courses through you and you finally force yourself to look up at his face.
The bastard is stillsmiling!
You growl against his skin and before you can say anything, he drags his fingers up your slit and sinks two of them into you - deeply. Your gasp is loud, and you surge forward, practically screaming into his skin. Just as before, he kept a steady, but almost maddeningly slow pace.
“Marcus!” You moan against his skin, burying your face into his warmth. “Please!”
You can’t see his smile morph into a smirk, but he was never one to deny you anything, so he obliges and increases his pace, letting the heel of his hand rub against your clit. Your hips jerk in time, fucking his hand as best you can even as your thighs shake from the raw pleasure coursing through you.
Before you know it, your pleasure crests and you come hard, almost impossibly so, screaming into his shoulder and eyes rolling into the back of your head. Your hips jerk and shake against his hand, which is stilled. When you stop, he slowly removes his hand and you drop your forehead against him.
You are in a daze, feelings of pleasure still pulsating throughout your body when you feel Marcus shift. But in the haze of your mind, you’re not quick enough to lift your head before he kneels behind you. He drags his hand up your spine and lays it on the back of your neck, fingers slowly massaging the skin there.
His light touch sends sparks of pleasure down your body, where they congregate in your now jerking hips. His smile, which has yet to leave his lips, takes on a more feral look as he rubs the head of his aching cock against you.
“Marcus!” You cry into the sheet, grasping at the fabric so hard that your knuckles have gone white. He relents and sinks into you with one shift of his hips. You cry out at the invasion, hips jerking in pleasure. His hands land on your skin, holding you tight for a moment.
He loves to feel you pulsating around his cock and he must force himself not to come just yet. When you whimper, he lets his hips draw back and then forward. Like with his fingers, he sets a maddeningly slow pace and you can barely breathe as the pleasure claws at your chest, your lungs, your heart.
You pull yourself up onto your hands, arms shaking from the pleasure that has seemed to rob you of your strength. And yet, you use the leverage to push back against his hips harder, pulling a moan from his chest. Your pants are loud, almost shrill as he begins to fuck you harder.
You never came off the high of your previous orgasm, so every move of his cock inside of you wrings every drop of want from you until your whole body is shaking in response. Soon, the tautness of your belly breaks again, and you clamp down hard on his cock and scream loudly into the pillow, throat nearly hurting from the rawness of it all.
You hear him groan behind you and with a few quick thrusts, he is coming and following you into the pleasure storm. After what seems like long minutes, he withdraws from you and you both collapse onto the bed. You turn your head and notice that his smile has been wiped off his face. And you can’t help but start smiling yourself. His eyes are closed as he struggles to capture his breath, but one of them crack open and sees you laying there with a large grin on your face.
“What’s that smile for, you sexy woman?”
“Nothing.”
“Hmm, I doubt that.”
Next day reblog, little late. Wow, I haven’t looked at my phone all day and this story is blowing up! Thanks for the love, y'all!
A/N:I pounded this bad boy out in 30 minutes, that’s how badly the idea needed to be written.
Reminder:I ain’t ever seen Pedro Pascal in FUCK ALL, I’m just coming up with this as I go along, using imdb.com, wiki, and 84,000 tabs I got open to plan out this shit. I also write soft versions of his characters so if you’re craving asshole vibes, I ain’t got any but my own to offer.
“What’s that smile for, you silly man?” You cock your head towards Marcus as he lays in bed, watching you finish toweling off from your shower. He slowly shakes his head.
“Nothing.”
“Hmm, I doubt that, Mr. Pike.” He continues to smile as you toss your towel on the arm of the reading chair, your nudity on full display for him and somehow that grin of his gets impossibly larger. You slowly walk towards him, feeling his eyes rake across your body, still flush from the hot shower you took.
You reach the edge of the bed and begin to crawl across it until your right next to him. You bend your head down to pepper soft kisses along his bare shoulder and you internally grin as you felt his muscles bunch and jump beneath your touch. You remain on all fours but lower your upper half so that you rest on your elbows, nipples tightening as your breasts sway against the soft sheets.
“Hello.” You brush your lips against his, letting the velvet skin send a shiver down your spine.
“Hello.” He kisses you back, his tongue begging entrance into your mouth and the shivers grow as you open to him. With your ass and core tilted upwards, you can feel the coolness of the room more intently as you began to get wetter.
You continue to kiss for long minutes and you’re so focused on the sensation of his lips and tongue against your mouth, you fail to notice that he has snaked his arm underneath you. Suddenly his thick fingers cup your mound and you rear back, gasping in pleasure and surprise. He continues to smile, a lazy tinge to it as his eyes drop to half-mast in pleasure.
He runs two fingers between the lips of your core, rubbing gently as he passes over your clit and you moan in pleasure, thighs wanting to clasp together. You drop your face to press it into his shoulder and your hands begin to grasp the sheets beneath you to anchor yourself against the onslaught of pleasure.
Marcus slows his ministrations and your hips jerk, seeking the friction he denies you. Suddenly, his fingers return to your clit and begin to rub in agonizingly slow circles. You gasp harshly against his skin and the moan you let out seems so loud. Your body trembles as the pleasure courses through you and you finally force yourself to look up at his face.
The bastard is stillsmiling!
You growl against his skin and before you can say anything, he drags his fingers up your slit and sinks two of them into you - deeply. Your gasp is loud, and you surge forward, practically screaming into his skin. Just as before, he kept a steady, but almost maddeningly slow pace.
“Marcus!” You moan against his skin, burying your face into his warmth. “Please!”
You can’t see his smile morph into a smirk, but he was never one to deny you anything, so he obliges and increases his pace, letting the heel of his hand rub against your clit. Your hips jerk in time, fucking his hand as best you can even as your thighs shake from the raw pleasure coursing through you.
Before you know it, your pleasure crests and you come hard, almost impossibly so, screaming into his shoulder and eyes rolling into the back of your head. Your hips jerk and shake against his hand, which is stilled. When you stop, he slowly removes his hand and you drop your forehead against him.
You are in a daze, feelings of pleasure still pulsating throughout your body when you feel Marcus shift. But in the haze of your mind, you’re not quick enough to lift your head before he kneels behind you. He drags his hand up your spine and lays it on the back of your neck, fingers slowly massaging the skin there.
His light touch sends sparks of pleasure down your body, where they congregate in your now jerking hips. His smile, which has yet to leave his lips, takes on a more feral look as he rubs the head of his aching cock against you.
“Marcus!” You cry into the sheet, grasping at the fabric so hard that your knuckles have gone white. He relents and sinks into you with one shift of his hips. You cry out at the invasion, hips jerking in pleasure. His hands land on your skin, holding you tight for a moment.
He loves to feel you pulsating around his cock and he must force himself not to come just yet. When you whimper, he lets his hips draw back and then forward. Like with his fingers, he sets a maddeningly slow pace and you can barely breathe as the pleasure claws at your chest, your lungs, your heart.
You pull yourself up onto your hands, arms shaking from the pleasure that has seemed to rob you of your strength. And yet, you use the leverage to push back against his hips harder, pulling a moan from his chest. Your pants are loud, almost shrill as he begins to fuck you harder.
You never came off the high of your previous orgasm, so every move of his cock inside of you wrings every drop of want from you until your whole body is shaking in response. Soon, the tautness of your belly breaks again, and you clamp down hard on his cock and scream loudly into the pillow, throat nearly hurting from the rawness of it all.
You hear him groan behind you and with a few quick thrusts, he is coming and following you into the pleasure storm. After what seems like long minutes, he withdraws from you and you both collapse onto the bed. You turn your head and notice that his smile has been wiped off his face. And you can’t help but start smiling yourself. His eyes are closed as he struggles to capture his breath, but one of them crack open and sees you laying there with a large grin on your face.
A/N: I am so glad I went on vacation! I’ve got a renewed interest in this story and I knocked out several new chapters over the last few days. I am also feeling the other stories I’ve got half cooked up. I need to take a mini vacation more often!
Reminder: I ain’t ever seen Pedro Pascal in FUCK ALL, I’m just coming up with this as I go along, using imdb.com, wiki, and 84,000 tabs I got open to plan out this shit. I also write soft versions of his characters so if you’re craving asshole vibes, I ain’t got any but my own to offer.
Part 4 – Good-bye is so Harsh, Just Say See You Later
“Dammit!” Agent Fitzgerald slammed his fist on the table, startling everyone in the room. Agent Armand peered at him over her glasses and he ducked his head under her steady, motherly gaze. Everyone went back to the work in front of them as Pike and Carmichael came over to see what the fuss was about.
The junior agent sighed as he leaned his head back. He had been working to clear up some surveillance video they got from a museum in Wisconsin who had reported a piece stolen in the 1990s. It took him three days to piecemeal the tape back together, which had deteriorated over the years due to bad storage. Then it took another week to render it clear enough to see what was going on. While the original notes state that the tape was grainy, the original agents didn’t clarify that the video looked as if someone smeared Crisco over the lens.
But finally, Fitzgerald had it watchable and as he peered closely at the tape, a subtle changed occurred, causing his outburst. When he looked up and saw Pike and Carmichael, he waved for them to sit down and started the digital video again.
“Tell me what you see?” The two agents watched the tape as the gallery sat devoid of people for the entirety of ten minutes. They sat back when the video ended and looked at the man watching them. “You missed it, didn’t you?”
“Missed what?” Questioned Carmichael, curious as to what he was talking about.
“The jump.” They looked at him and he gave a sardonic chuckle, knowing that they missed what the original agents missed back then. He rewound the tape to about the halfway point and started it again. This time, the partners leaned in and stared closely at the video. Fitzgerald knew when they saw the skip because both sets of eyebrows shot up at the same time.
“Whoever this crew is, they know where the cameras are and how to alter them.” The man leaned back and rubbed his eyes. “And they know how to make it look seamless. Although the analog video was grainy, I didn’t catch it the first time I saw it digitally.”
“I think we need to get all the rest of the videos that we can review.” Pike sat back, his brain already working up a plan. “How long will it take you to review all the tapes?”
“I’m not sure, not more than a couple of days, assuming I don’t have to fix them like I did this one.” Came the reply. The special agent nodded, his eyes unfocused as he began to add this new information into his mental files.
“Pike, what are you thinking?” Carmichael stood up, waving over Agent Horacio. She mumbled to them that she needed all the tapes from all the cases gathered up and given to Fitzgerald. They nodded and walked off to begin the task at hand.
“I’m thinking we need to go back and ask people about their surveillance systems. If we can prove even the private collections had tampered videos, then this isn’t an inside job like we originally thought, it might be more. And we need to recognize this is more sophisticated than we’ve been giving them credit for.” The two agents looked at him and nodded with a shared smile. After working on these cold cases for months, they had something to go on – finally.
-*-
“Hey Carmichael, I’m going to run out for lunch, you want anything?” Pike stuck his head into her office, eyebrows slightly raised. She poked her head up, her dark eyes look dull and bleary. “You look exhausted, maybe you should go home.”
“Maybe you should be quiet for a moment Pike.” Her voice sounded scratchy and lower than normal. “And come here for a second, I need another pair of eyes.
Her partner walked over to the desk, taking silent note that she looked smaller and the exhaustion was etched into her face. Taking up a spot next to her chair, Pike leaned over to read what she was pointing at. One of the junior agents had created a compilation of quotations from the original interviews in each of the cold cases and then a list of ones from the new interviews they had been conducting since June. She watched him as he skimmed the papers and as his eyebrows rose higher on his forehead, her tired smile got bigger and bigger. He glanced over at her.
“Is this all true?” His voice sounded excited and she vigorously nodded. “Oh my god, Carmichael!”
“I know Pike! I had Horacio and Fitzgerald both review this before I looked at it. Every single one of these cases were executed the same way. This is one team we’re hunting, and they were responsible for every single case.”
Pike started to laugh in relief. There had been concern among him, Carmichael, and Armand that they were looking at unrelated cases or possible copycats, which did little to narrow their search. But the interviews showed the same pattern every single time, the original agents just never cross-matched their case with any open ones.
“They’ve been able to actively do this since, what? 1982? I’m going to go out on a limb and say it’s the same group but may have had different people over the years. No way someone who was forty in 1982 is still out here robbing the say way almost forty years later.” Pike looked at Carmichael.
“You’re probably right but let me take it a step further and say they kept their theft team the same as long as they could. Someone new comes in, they learn the ways of the crew and as old members died or went to jail, new members came in. But I bet at least two-thirds of the crew were long-timers and so that’s why there was little to no deviation from case to case. The newbies become the experts by the time more new kids are recruited.” She paused. “Which I think is how all these cases ultimately were executed in virtually the same way over such a long period of time.”
“So, what we have is a sophisticated theft ring that spans nearly forty years and at least seven countries. They are so good that not one of the thirty pieces stolen have been recovered nor had the cases been connected until recently. And of course, they are all still out there, not having been caught for these specific crimes.” Pike stood up and scratched his jaw, the dark stubble rough under his fingertips. “What does that sound like to you?”
Carmichael closed the folder and sat back in her chair. The dull look to her eyes gave away to their more familiar sparkle as she bared her teeth in a bright smile.
“Sounds like mafia to me.”
—***—
Rosemary shifted in the bed, letting Banana wiggle his way between her body and Robert’s emaciated frame. In the week since she had dinner with him and Fern, his progress went downhill rapidly, and Rosemary rarely left the room. Although the late September day was chilly, all the windows were open because he wanted to smell Saugatuck.
As the dog got comfortable, she laid her head back down on the pillow and rested her arm on his warm body so she could take Robert’s hand into hers. The last forty-eight hours had been the hardest as he delved further and further into delusion, speaking in a foreign language one moment and in English the next. Sometimes he spoke of names that were unfamiliar to her, as if he were remembering a time many years ago.
The sun was lowering in the sky when Robert turned his head and glanced towards the young woman next to him. For a long moment they looked at each other, the silence between them worn and old and comfortable. But something in Robert, his old self, fought to the top and through the delusion to speak to her, his voice cracking under the strain.
“I love you Rosie. I always have. You are my daughter as sure as if I fathered you myself.” He could see the tears forming in her eyes and her throat moving as she tried to swallow them, not wanting him to see her cry. She nodded at him.
“I love you, Robert. Thank you for being in my life.” He smiled and closed his eyes, sighing. They laid like that for another hour before he opened his eyes again and looked at her. He scanned her face as if trying to memorize her freckles or her hazel eyes or that weird scar on her forehead. He finally looked her in the eye and smiled.
He took a deep breath and closed his eyes. And as the sun set, he was gone. Banana lifted his head and began to cry as Rosemary let her tears flow. She scooted over and wrapped herself around Robert and cried and cried. A small part of her seemed to die with him as she felt empty – far emptier than when Pops and Grams died.
She was truly alone now.
—***—
“Rose?” A soft knock came at the bathroom door, Amy’s lilting voice on the other side sounded muffled through the wood. “Honey?”
Rosemary sat on the toilet, slumped over and her face in a daze. Her hands rested on her thighs, gripping at her sleeping shorts mindlessly. She didn’t say anything, her throat raw and sore from her crying. When Amy opened the door, she bit her lip at the scene before her.
After Robert finally passed, Rosemary laid with him for an hour before pulling herself from the bed to call the funeral home. When Benson Harwood arrived with his assistant, they immediately went about preparing to remove the body as she stood by the door, arms wrapped around her torso. She shivered as she watched the two of them work, but when they zipped closed the body bag, rendering Robert from sight, she dropped to her knees and began to keen loudly.
The assistant, who was new, jumped back at the sound, but Benson had been around long enough to know what to do. The heavy-set man with kind eyes sat down on the floor next to her and held her in his arms. Rosemary cried Robert’s name over and over for nearly half an hour. When she couldn’t cry out loud anymore, she pulled away from Benson and curled into a ball on the floor, blocking the door.
“Rosemary, we need to take him. It’s time for him to go.” The funeral director rubbed her back, recognizing the shock of loss in her eyes. Like others, he knew of her close relationship with Robert and had told his wife that he was glad the old man had someone with him in his last days. He looked around the room before his eyes laid on her cell phone on the bed. “Rose, can I call someone for you?”
She laid there, practically catatonic when the assistant touched Benson’s shoulder. He looked up and nodded at her before she walked over and got the phone. He asked gently for her to unlock it so he could call her friends and her shaky fingers took three tries before her home screen popped up. When he saw the group text, he pressed dial for the first name he saw in the chat.
After explaining the situation, Amy Anton agreed to come help with her distraught friend. When she arrived, she was able to coax Rosemary off the floor, who merely crawled into the bathroom and closed the door behind her. The three looked at each other and Amy finished with Benson so they could leave. After texting Fern and Tina, she knocked on the door.
“Rosie… “
“No. That was his name for me. No.” Her voice crackled with rawness, her vocal cords in screaming pain at the movement. She turned her head to look at Amy and the tears spilled over her cheeks. “I’m alone. Alone.”
The crying began again and as if all sensation left her body, Rosemary slid off the toilet and hit the wall. She seemed impervious to pain, but Amy still shrieked out at the sight. She couldn’t muffle her own tears as she dropped to the cold tile to scoop up her friend in her arms. Tina and Fern’s footsteps echoed through the house as they arrived, and both stopped when they found the duo on the floor.
Without a second thought, the two women dropped down and enveloped their sobbing friend and held her for what seemed like hours. Eventually, they convinced her to get into the shower and then into bed. As Amy cleaned up Robert’s room, Fern called her paralegal to begin the post-death legal process, and Tina took Banana for a walk before curling up in bed with Rosemary. Sleep avoided the four women that night and for the first time in a long time, Rosemary dreaded the morning sunlight.
Next day reblog. Things start to pick up in the next chapter and soon our two storylines will converge!
A/N: I am so glad I went on vacation! I’ve got a renewed interest in this story and I knocked out several new chapters over the last few days. I am also feeling the other stories I’ve got half cooked up. I need to take a mini vacation more often!
Reminder: I ain’t ever seen Pedro Pascal in FUCK ALL, I’m just coming up with this as I go along, using imdb.com, wiki, and 84,000 tabs I got open to plan out this shit. I also write soft versions of his characters so if you’re craving asshole vibes, I ain’t got any but my own to offer.
Part 4 – Good-bye is so Harsh, Just Say See You Later
“Dammit!” Agent Fitzgerald slammed his fist on the table, startling everyone in the room. Agent Armand peered at him over her glasses and he ducked his head under her steady, motherly gaze. Everyone went back to the work in front of them as Pike and Carmichael came over to see what the fuss was about.
The junior agent sighed as he leaned his head back. He had been working to clear up some surveillance video they got from a museum in Wisconsin who had reported a piece stolen in the 1990s. It took him three days to piecemeal the tape back together, which had deteriorated over the years due to bad storage. Then it took another week to render it clear enough to see what was going on. While the original notes state that the tape was grainy, the original agents didn’t clarify that the video looked as if someone smeared Crisco over the lens.
But finally, Fitzgerald had it watchable and as he peered closely at the tape, a subtle changed occurred, causing his outburst. When he looked up and saw Pike and Carmichael, he waved for them to sit down and started the digital video again.
“Tell me what you see?” The two agents watched the tape as the gallery sat devoid of people for the entirety of ten minutes. They sat back when the video ended and looked at the man watching them. “You missed it, didn’t you?”
“Missed what?” Questioned Carmichael, curious as to what he was talking about.
“The jump.” They looked at him and he gave a sardonic chuckle, knowing that they missed what the original agents missed back then. He rewound the tape to about the halfway point and started it again. This time, the partners leaned in and stared closely at the video. Fitzgerald knew when they saw the skip because both sets of eyebrows shot up at the same time.
“Whoever this crew is, they know where the cameras are and how to alter them.” The man leaned back and rubbed his eyes. “And they know how to make it look seamless. Although the analog video was grainy, I didn’t catch it the first time I saw it digitally.”
“I think we need to get all the rest of the videos that we can review.” Pike sat back, his brain already working up a plan. “How long will it take you to review all the tapes?”
“I’m not sure, not more than a couple of days, assuming I don’t have to fix them like I did this one.” Came the reply. The special agent nodded, his eyes unfocused as he began to add this new information into his mental files.
“Pike, what are you thinking?” Carmichael stood up, waving over Agent Horacio. She mumbled to them that she needed all the tapes from all the cases gathered up and given to Fitzgerald. They nodded and walked off to begin the task at hand.
“I’m thinking we need to go back and ask people about their surveillance systems. If we can prove even the private collections had tampered videos, then this isn’t an inside job like we originally thought, it might be more. And we need to recognize this is more sophisticated than we’ve been giving them credit for.” The two agents looked at him and nodded with a shared smile. After working on these cold cases for months, they had something to go on – finally.
-*-
“Hey Carmichael, I’m going to run out for lunch, you want anything?” Pike stuck his head into her office, eyebrows slightly raised. She poked her head up, her dark eyes look dull and bleary. “You look exhausted, maybe you should go home.”
“Maybe you should be quiet for a moment Pike.” Her voice sounded scratchy and lower than normal. “And come here for a second, I need another pair of eyes.
Her partner walked over to the desk, taking silent note that she looked smaller and the exhaustion was etched into her face. Taking up a spot next to her chair, Pike leaned over to read what she was pointing at. One of the junior agents had created a compilation of quotations from the original interviews in each of the cold cases and then a list of ones from the new interviews they had been conducting since June. She watched him as he skimmed the papers and as his eyebrows rose higher on his forehead, her tired smile got bigger and bigger. He glanced over at her.
“Is this all true?” His voice sounded excited and she vigorously nodded. “Oh my god, Carmichael!”
“I know Pike! I had Horacio and Fitzgerald both review this before I looked at it. Every single one of these cases were executed the same way. This is one team we’re hunting, and they were responsible for every single case.”
Pike started to laugh in relief. There had been concern among him, Carmichael, and Armand that they were looking at unrelated cases or possible copycats, which did little to narrow their search. But the interviews showed the same pattern every single time, the original agents just never cross-matched their case with any open ones.
“They’ve been able to actively do this since, what? 1982? I’m going to go out on a limb and say it’s the same group but may have had different people over the years. No way someone who was forty in 1982 is still out here robbing the say way almost forty years later.” Pike looked at Carmichael.
“You’re probably right but let me take it a step further and say they kept their theft team the same as long as they could. Someone new comes in, they learn the ways of the crew and as old members died or went to jail, new members came in. But I bet at least two-thirds of the crew were long-timers and so that’s why there was little to no deviation from case to case. The newbies become the experts by the time more new kids are recruited.” She paused. “Which I think is how all these cases ultimately were executed in virtually the same way over such a long period of time.”
“So, what we have is a sophisticated theft ring that spans nearly forty years and at least seven countries. They are so good that not one of the thirty pieces stolen have been recovered nor had the cases been connected until recently. And of course, they are all still out there, not having been caught for these specific crimes.” Pike stood up and scratched his jaw, the dark stubble rough under his fingertips. “What does that sound like to you?”
Carmichael closed the folder and sat back in her chair. The dull look to her eyes gave away to their more familiar sparkle as she bared her teeth in a bright smile.
“Sounds like mafia to me.”
—***—
Rosemary shifted in the bed, letting Banana wiggle his way between her body and Robert’s emaciated frame. In the week since she had dinner with him and Fern, his progress went downhill rapidly, and Rosemary rarely left the room. Although the late September day was chilly, all the windows were open because he wanted to smell Saugatuck.
As the dog got comfortable, she laid her head back down on the pillow and rested her arm on his warm body so she could take Robert’s hand into hers. The last forty-eight hours had been the hardest as he delved further and further into delusion, speaking in a foreign language one moment and in English the next. Sometimes he spoke of names that were unfamiliar to her, as if he were remembering a time many years ago.
The sun was lowering in the sky when Robert turned his head and glanced towards the young woman next to him. For a long moment they looked at each other, the silence between them worn and old and comfortable. But something in Robert, his old self, fought to the top and through the delusion to speak to her, his voice cracking under the strain.
“I love you Rosie. I always have. You are my daughter as sure as if I fathered you myself.” He could see the tears forming in her eyes and her throat moving as she tried to swallow them, not wanting him to see her cry. She nodded at him.
“I love you, Robert. Thank you for being in my life.” He smiled and closed his eyes, sighing. They laid like that for another hour before he opened his eyes again and looked at her. He scanned her face as if trying to memorize her freckles or her hazel eyes or that weird scar on her forehead. He finally looked her in the eye and smiled.
He took a deep breath and closed his eyes. And as the sun set, he was gone. Banana lifted his head and began to cry as Rosemary let her tears flow. She scooted over and wrapped herself around Robert and cried and cried. A small part of her seemed to die with him as she felt empty – far emptier than when Pops and Grams died.
She was truly alone now.
—***—
“Rose?” A soft knock came at the bathroom door, Amy’s lilting voice on the other side sounded muffled through the wood. “Honey?”
Rosemary sat on the toilet, slumped over and her face in a daze. Her hands rested on her thighs, gripping at her sleeping shorts mindlessly. She didn’t say anything, her throat raw and sore from her crying. When Amy opened the door, she bit her lip at the scene before her.
After Robert finally passed, Rosemary laid with him for an hour before pulling herself from the bed to call the funeral home. When Benson Harwood arrived with his assistant, they immediately went about preparing to remove the body as she stood by the door, arms wrapped around her torso. She shivered as she watched the two of them work, but when they zipped closed the body bag, rendering Robert from sight, she dropped to her knees and began to keen loudly.
The assistant, who was new, jumped back at the sound, but Benson had been around long enough to know what to do. The heavy-set man with kind eyes sat down on the floor next to her and held her in his arms. Rosemary cried Robert’s name over and over for nearly half an hour. When she couldn’t cry out loud anymore, she pulled away from Benson and curled into a ball on the floor, blocking the door.
“Rosemary, we need to take him. It’s time for him to go.” The funeral director rubbed her back, recognizing the shock of loss in her eyes. Like others, he knew of her close relationship with Robert and had told his wife that he was glad the old man had someone with him in his last days. He looked around the room before his eyes laid on her cell phone on the bed. “Rose, can I call someone for you?”
She laid there, practically catatonic when the assistant touched Benson’s shoulder. He looked up and nodded at her before she walked over and got the phone. He asked gently for her to unlock it so he could call her friends and her shaky fingers took three tries before her home screen popped up. When he saw the group text, he pressed dial for the first name he saw in the chat.
After explaining the situation, Amy Anton agreed to come help with her distraught friend. When she arrived, she was able to coax Rosemary off the floor, who merely crawled into the bathroom and closed the door behind her. The three looked at each other and Amy finished with Benson so they could leave. After texting Fern and Tina, she knocked on the door.
“Rosie… “
“No. That was his name for me. No.” Her voice crackled with rawness, her vocal cords in screaming pain at the movement. She turned her head to look at Amy and the tears spilled over her cheeks. “I’m alone. Alone.”
The crying began again and as if all sensation left her body, Rosemary slid off the toilet and hit the wall. She seemed impervious to pain, but Amy still shrieked out at the sight. She couldn’t muffle her own tears as she dropped to the cold tile to scoop up her friend in her arms. Tina and Fern’s footsteps echoed through the house as they arrived, and both stopped when they found the duo on the floor.
Without a second thought, the two women dropped down and enveloped their sobbing friend and held her for what seemed like hours. Eventually, they convinced her to get into the shower and then into bed. As Amy cleaned up Robert’s room, Fern called her paralegal to begin the post-death legal process, and Tina took Banana for a walk before curling up in bed with Rosemary. Sleep avoided the four women that night and for the first time in a long time, Rosemary dreaded the morning sunlight.
A/N:I’ll be on vacation this week, but I’m hoping to post weekly - Thursdays as reblogs of the previous chapter, Fridays around 6pm EST new chapters, and Saturdays as next day reblogs. And then posting when ever I so choose for one shots and drabbles.
Reminder:I ain’t ever seen Pedro Pascal in FUCK ALL, I’m just coming up with this as I go along, using imdb.com, wiki, and 84,000 tabs I got open to plan out this shit. I also write soft versions of his characters so if you’re craving asshole vibes, I ain’t got any but my own to offer.
Tag List:
@zeldasayer , @beskars , @coolmaybelateruniverse , @the-feckless-wonder , @pascalisthepunkest , @mandoandyodito , @randomness501 , @fioccodineveautunnale , @ahopelessromanticwritersworld , @lilkermit14 , @tortles [please message me to be added or subtracted]
Part 3 – The Clock is the Enemy
“What a beautiful day, Rosie.” Robert’s smile was small, but evident. He laid back in the patio chair with a blanket around his shoulders. The normally oppressive summer heat of August had been milder this year, but Robert was always cold now. His shoulders hunched over under the heavy cotton fabric, as if the weight of the world were on them.
She looked over at him from inside the kitchen and smiled, glad that he was feeling more energetic today then he had been the last couple of weeks. She had taken him to the doctor this morning and the news was grim – mere weeks were probably left for Robert and her heart clenched as she realized she had to watch yet another person she loved slowly die in front of her. Tears sprung in her eyes and she quickly looked away so he couldn’t see them.
She stood at the stove waiting for the coffee to finish, her hands tapping the side of the brightly decorated mug in front of her. Since his confession months ago about his diagnosis, she spent as much time with him as she could, helping him as he got his affairs in order. Last week, she moved in with him as his health took a turn for the worse and he struggled to care for himself. He felt as if he should have told her no, but he was so grateful for her, he remained quiet on the subject.
When the foam had dissipated, she poured in the cognac and topped it off with a lemon slice – just the way Robert always took his coffee at home. She carried it out on to the porch and sat next to him. He sipped the hot liquid and smiled.
“You know, my mother drank her coffee like this, too.” He nodded at Rosemary’s inquisitive look. He never talked about his family or his existence before Saugatuck, claiming his life here along the coast of Lake Michigan had enough memories to explore for a lifetime.
“I never heard of anyone drinking their coffee like that before I met you.”
“You don’t know a lot of Ukrainians, then.” He smiled. “She drank it with more cognac than is probably recommended, but she needed the pep in her step as she headed off to work.”
“What did she do?”
“She taught home ec at a local high school.” He grinned as Rosemary started to laugh.
“Did she include the coffee recipe in her class?”
“No, but it would have probably helped!”
The two laughed again and soon it petered out to a comfortable silence. The trees waved slightly in the breeze and they could hear the kids down the road shouting and laughing. The day was perfect and they both soaked it up knowing that these were numbered.
—***—
“Marcus! I’m so glad you called!” Hetty Pike’s smile was evident in her tone as she heard her only son’s voice on the other end of the line.
“Hi, mom.” He couldn’t help but grin every time he talked to his mother. She was a bubbly woman who talked with her hands a lot. When he was a kid, she always held his face in her hands and told him that she loved him, her head shaking as if to reiterate what she said. When he’d protested the action as a teenager, she told him she’d never stop because it was her duty to know he was always loved. “Is dad around?”
“Abe! Abe! Pick up! Marcus is on the phone!” He could hear her voice clearly even as she pulled away to call out to her husband. Pike rolled his eyes with a small smile as he heard his father’s booming voice come over the line, drowning out his much softer mother, who said her good-byes while the two men talked.
“Son! It’s been ages! How goes the art thieving?”
“Not bad, dad. I’m calling because I have a question.”
“Shoot.”
For the next hour, they chatted as Marcus sought out his dad’s advice on various aspects of the reopened cases. The senior Pike had been an electrician before he retired and often provided advice to the agent on cases where he could, often becoming a sounding board as his son worked verbally through the case.
After walking through a few scenarios, Hetty got back on the line and the three talked about this and that for a while longer before Pike said his good-byes with promises to call more often and to try and come out for his sister’s 40th birthday party next month.
The energy of the phone call dissipated into nothing as Pike stood in his kitchen, the quiet house a stark contrast to the liveliness he grew up with. He became lost in thought as memories flitted through his brain – happy memories of his parents who were so deeply in love, every day was a chance to prove it to the other; of his sisters and him getting into numerous shenanigans that left them breathless with laughter; of his blue-collar father being proud of his son’s artistic talent and happily attending his shows.
Pike let himself smile a bit before pushing himself off the counter, pocketing his phone as he wandered down the hall into his studio. He bought the small two-bedroom house in the outskirts of D.C. because its large windows let in tons of natural light, allowing him to set up an in-home studio to indulge his artistic appetite in.
Art had always been Marcus’ passion and something he had been good at since he was quite young. He was proud that he could parlay that passion into a career. He didn’t do anything professionally, instead choosing to let his talent serve as a distraction from the stress of real life. As he sat in front of the blank canvas, his hands rested in his lap, fiddling with the pencil.
By this time, his brain was creating a mash up of his memories and Carmichael’s words from some months ago. He hadn’t been on a date since the last time he was stood up, but no matter how much he hardened his heart, he still yearned for someone to love, the kind that his parents had. The kind he thought he had with his first wife, then Lisbon, then Eleanor and Carrie and Sumata.
It seems the only place he could express his heart freely and without pain was on the canvas. He shook his head as he turned on his playlist and let himself get lost in the one place that he could be himself with no judgement.
—***—
Several Days Later
“Helen?” The director looked up from her desk and looked startled at the pale woman standing in front of her. She immediately rose and skirted the desk to take Rosemary in her arms, giving her a warm hug. She felt the younger woman’s arms snake around her waist, and she continued to hold her as sudden sobs wracked the body pressed against her own. They stood like that for many long minutes before Rosemary pulled away and wiped her eyes on the back of her hand.
The two women sat down in the office chairs and Helen took Rosemary’s hand again, noticing the slight tremors she failed to feel before. She squeezed slightly and waited.
“Helen, I need to take some time off. Robert is getting worse and I don’t want to leave him alone right now. I know I have vacation…” Helen cut her off.
“Take all the time you need. I know this has been hard for you, don’t worry about us here. We’re fine. Marquetta can handle anything that comes in for you and I’ll take over the programs you are scheduled to work. You need to focus on you and Robert.” She didn’t say it, but the and your good-byes hung in the air between them.
“Okay. Thank you.” Rosemary stood on shaky legs and they hugged again before she went to her office. Despite the grief that hung around her neck like an albatross, she set her away message on her voicemail and email before packing a few things up for Banana. The dog had gone with her to Robert’s and the mutt spent his days sleeping against Robert’s frail form, providing a steady stream of warmth and companionship when Rosemary was at work.
After looking around her neatened desk, she walked to her workshop and glanced around there. She left a few notes for Marquetta on some projects that needed to be completed before walking over to her locked cabinet. She pulled out her keys and opened it, glancing at the bronze sculpture housed inside. She looked at it for a bit longer before closing the doors again. It was still on her to-do list but it was going to have to wait; Helen knew it was there, but only Rosemary had access. With the turn of her key, she left the museum to focus on the one person who needed her the most.
—***—
Three weeks later
The day was a sunny one, the sky a deep azure blue that spoke of the coming fall and as he laid in bed with the windows open, Robert took as deep a breath as his lungs would let him. He loved Saugatuck in the fall – the leaves, the roadside stands that popped up as the harvest came to fruition, and he loved to decorate the store as Halloween grew closer.
He let himself get lost in the memories of the past for a moment before forcing himself to focus on the paperwork in front of him. His lawyer had dropped off a new copy of his will and testament and Robert carefully read everything before signing it. Even as he laid there dying, there was something about signing the will that created a finality to it all.
As he sealed the envelope and sent a text to the lawyer to come pick it up, he heard Rosemary enter the house. He could smell food and for the first time in days, he felt his stomach grumble in hunger. He began to push himself out of bed when Rosemary enter the room and frowned at him.
“Get back in bed.” Her tone was firm, but gentle.
“I can get up; I’m not going to eat in my bed.” Robert grumbled as she walked over and gently pressed him back into the pillows. Rosemary was only a couple of inches shorter than his six-foot frame, but with his body becoming weaker, she seemed taller and stronger than she ever had before to him.
“You’re going to stay here. I don’t need you falling like you did yesterday and scaring the bejesus out of me.” Rosemary wandered back into the kitchen, pulling out the take-out boxes from Coral Gables. She arranged everything on a tray and took it into the bedroom. Just as she set everything down, a knock came at the door. She walked back towards the front of the house, seeing a woman standing on the other side of the screen door.
“Fern!” Rosemary was surprised to see her close friend on the porch, her voice rising in excitement. They hugged and Fern made sure to squeeze her poor friend a little harder than usual. They broke apart. “What are you doing here?”
“Robert is one of my clients. I dropped off some paperwork for him earlier and he told me to come pick them up. Sorry to interrupt dinner.”
“Never! Come in, I bought more than enough, and he won’t eat that much.” Rosemary’s voice dropped a little and she smiled slightly as a friendly hand rested on her wrist. “Anyway, please stay and join us.”
Fern nodded and walked into the house towards the bedroom as Rosemary ran to get more plates and silverware. When she entered the room, the two were in discussion, their voices low and serious. The conversation stopped as she walked up to them and both smiled at her.
The three sat and ate, enjoying each other’s company and Rosemary noted that Robert ate more than he usually did, which made her feel better. Fern stayed long after dinner was over and as Robert dozed off, the two women continued to visit, but moved the conversation into the living room.
They had been friends for several years, meeting after bumping into each other at Robert’s store. Soon their duo became a quartet as local banker Amy met them at a local charity event and Rosemary’s old college friend Tina joined them as she set up her vet practice in Douglas, just south of the town. The three women had been worried about Rosemary for weeks, visiting where they could and keeping a lively group text going.
When she realized it was midnight, Fern took her leave and Rosemary cleaned up the kitchen. She walked into Robert’s bedroom to check on him. He woke up when he heard her and smiled. She touched his shoulder and sat in the chair next to his bed, the place she spent the most time in these days.
“I’m sorry I woke you. How are you feeling?” He reached out to pat her hand and she held it as tight as she dared. He was so pale, as if he were fading away from her in front of her very eyes.
“Like death warmed over.” The chuckle sounded strained as his breathing continued to be hard for him. “Rosie, I never said it, but I’m glad you’re here.”
“I always make time for you, Robert. You know that.”
“And dinner is always Coral Gables.”
“Exactly. Tradition.”
“Tradition.” Robert coughed hard and heavy. He took the tissue she handed to him and wiped the spittle from his mouth. “A good historian loves tradition.”
“And the story it tells.” She sat back and watched him. He suddenly looked at her, as if he were seeing her for the first time.
“Rosie, are you happy?” She looked at him, surprise on her face. “I mean in general. I’ve never seen you date anyone long term, you hardly go on vacation. You work a lot. Are you happy?”
“I guess? I don’t know. I love my work, I have the girls, I have you. And yeah, sure I could do with more vacation time, but who doesn’t?” She looked away, focusing on the window, although it was too dark to see. “Dating is… It’s not easy and most men don’t seem to appreciate my odd hours. Or I’m too tall. Or I’m too loud. And I’d rather be single and happy than in a relationship and miserable.”
“That’s fair.” He smiled. “What happened to that doctor in Kalamazoo?”
“Him?” She wrinkled her nose. “God, he was a massive asshole. Ego the size of the Grand Canyon. I went on two dates with him and had enough.”
Robert laugh slightly before sighing.
“I just worry about you Rose. I don’t want you to be alone when I’m gone. I want you to live a happy life, full of love that you deserve. Promise me that you’ll make time for that.”
“I promise, Robert.” She smiled as his eyes drooped closed, his soft snores starting almost immediately. She set back in the chair, propping her feet up on the edge of the bed to watch him until sleep came to claim her.
Reminder reblog for tomorrow’s new chapter. While my vacation wasn’t as much of a vacation as I had hoped, I did make serious headway into the story!
Marcus Pike x female Reader Co-written with @absurdthirst
Recently arrived in Texas and only slightly removed from his divorce, Marcus finds himself smitten with the women at the housewares store that is helping him furnish his new Austin condo. It becomes a more complicated situation than he could have expected, but Marcus has never been one to shy away from a challenge when love is on the line. ✨This fic takes place *before* the events of The Mentalist.✨
Rating: E for Extremely Explicit! Word Count:16.4k Warnings: Cursing and food/alcohol mentions. Blanket warnings for this fic will include divorce, past abusive relationships, deceased parents, father issues. Summary: Whether you technically want to call it your first or second date with Marcus, a movie and dinner becomes quite an adventure when you realize that the two of you have a few key things in common. Notes: We’re ramping things up right out of the gate here, guys. Hold on to your hats!
With five minutes left until six o’clock you’ve managed to force yourself to stop pacing the main floor of your place. Instead, you’re sitting in your kitchen with a mug of tea and nervously twirling the small ring you’ve chosen as an accessory round and around your finger. It had been nearly impossible to think about anything besides Marcus for the rest of your shift. Everything seemed to push your thoughts back to him. Not that they ever strayed far from him in the first place.
Marcus had to stop setting up everything about an hour before, switching gears and showering so he could get dressed in something that was appropriate for a date. Nothing too formal, but he paired dark jeans and boots with a maroon button-down shirt and his leather jacket. The dishwasher hummed and he had just transferred the clothes over to the dryer. Kitchen towels and bathroom towels are all ready to be folded and put away once they are done.
He checks his watch and gives a grin, time to head over. He picks up the small bouquet of flowers he had stopped by to grab after he had dropped you off at work and gives himself a small nod. “Time to go, don’t embarrass yourself Pike, you like this woman and she’s your neighbor.”
You shake your head and grin when the sound of the doorbell chimes at six sharp, wondering what Marcus must think of your roommate’s playful motion to replace the neighborhood-standard ding dong with something more akin to music. “Right on time,” you practically beam at him when you open the door. He’s somehow even more attractive than he was a few hours ago, and is very sweetly holding out a small handful of gorgeous flowers. “Come on in. I’ll get a vase for those beauties.”
He steps inside, pleased to find that it is a mirror image of his own place. “Well now I don’t have to explain how big my living room is.” He teases, remembering how flustered you became when you had said something about it that could be construed in a completely different kind of way.
Snickering lightly, you dig an empty vase out of a cabinet and toss him a pointed look. “You pushed the innuendo on that one. You’d just gotten done asking about a people to cuddlesection!”
“Valid question for a single man who just wants someone to love.” He argues playfully. “It’s better than trying one of those dating apps.” He shudders slightly at the idea.
“I have to admit, they can suck.” A lot of your more recent dating has been done via app and blind set ups with Naomi’s boyfriend’s friends, but clearly none of them have stuck.
“I get the theory behind them.” Marcus shrugs and steps closer as you put water in the vase. He leans against your counter and sweeps his eyes up and down your figure in appreciation. “I just like an interesting meet-cute. Like ours. It’s honestly fascinating in my opinion and so much better than ‘we matched’. ”
“Retail makes it harder sometimes. All those fun weekend activities where people meet and chat and get to know each other? I’m usually working then. It’s only with the new promotion that I’m getting some of my nights and weekend time back.” The beautiful bouquet is easily deposited into the vase with some water, and you set it down on the kitchen island in front of you with a satisfied smile. “But I like our meet-cute better, too. It’ll be a very cute story if we ever have occasion to tell it.”
“Well.” Marcus shoots you a smile as you admire the flowers. “I say that we start our first date and see if we have reason to tell people about a meet-cute or that date from hell with the person I unfortunately live next to now and just wave to awkwardly.” He jokes. If things didn’t work out, he wouldn’t treat you any different from any neighbors he had in the past. He just wasn’t that type of man.
“I doubt you’ve ever been anyone’s Date From Hell, Marcus Pike.” One quick reach and you’re picking up your purse from the kitchen island and nudging him toward the front door.
He chuckles. “Then you’ve never heard about the time my car broke down, I spilled my beer on her, my credit card was declined, and it started pouring down rain while we walked to a phone alllllllll in one date.” He tells you as he guides you over to his car. “Classic definition of a date from hell. ”
“Oh,noooo.” The laughter that bubbles out of you is apologetic, to say the least. “That sounds awful. But it wasn’t because you did something wrong.”
“True.” He huffs and opens the door for you. “But it doesn’t count as anywhere close to the top ten dates.”
Once you’re both settled in the car you settle back with a comfortable sigh. “Tell me about one of the top ten, then. The funniest date or the best one or the one that is the most nostalgic.”
“Well….” Marcus knows that it’s not good protocol to talk about past relationships, but you asked. “I reserved a suite at the best hotel and had a full spa package arranged complete with room service.” He offers. “That was a fantastic weekend.”
“You like to make a fuss.” The revelation makes you smile, glad to see that the Marcus you met today who does small things like hold doors and pick up trash from the table, is consistently thoughtful. Not just as a means of making a good first impression.
“I do.” He doesn’t apologize for it, knowing that some might not like it, but it was a part of his personality. “Acts of services?” He offers with a smile.
“I’ll remember that.” Preferring to go into this with the idea of it lasting, you want to keep track of the important things early on. If it ends up fizzling out, it won’t be because of a lack of intention. “I’m kind of a words of affirmation and gifts combo.”
“Noted.” He tosses you a grin. “And if I get to be too much, just— you know, you can always say something. I never want to overstep.” He knows that there are certain people who hate having things done for them and he respects it.
“We’ll find a rhythm.” That’s something you’re fairly certain of, given the fact that you’re both reasonable adults and have so far been very upfront about your interest in each other. “As long as this doesn’t unseat your worst ever date story tonight, and we decide to see what happens…we’ll find a rhythm. Just…if you’re not a good morning and good night text kind of person, tell me now.”
That makes him grin and he shakes his head. “I’m more of a 'hey I called to let you know that I’m going to be ten minutes late and is there anything you need when I am on my way?’ type of person.” He had stopped calling Amanda when she seemed so annoyed by it, but in the end she seemed annoyed no matter what he had done.
“We’re the people who drive other people crazy,” you observe softly. “Checking in, sending notes, holding doors, doing things preemptively to try to lighten the load.” It actually makes you chuckle, the way that the two of you seem to line up. Even Naomi likes to give you grief about the little notes you drop in her purse sometimes when she has something big coming up, or the fact that you always seem to have one of her favorite bath bombs stashed for when she’s having a bad day.
“Can’t be a bad thing, right?” He asks.
“For us?” You shake your head, offering him a smile as he drives. “No. It’s good for us. But other people are missing out on the excellence that is our affection.”
He appreciates the outlook you have on it and hums when he stops at a red light. “What about you? I want to know your worst and best dates. See where the bar is at.”
“Let’s see.” Humming dramatically, you love the way he lights up a little when he looks over at you again before the light turns green. “Worst would be from college. The guy who took me to his little brother’s little league game because I said I like baseball. I gave him the benefit of the doubt, thinking he was trying to be cute about it, but he proceeded to spend the entire game yelling corrections at the kids and telling me why they should give up on sports early to avoid disappointment.” It’s sort of funny now - mostly you just feel bad for the little brother and literally anyone who has met him since. “And the ‘picnic’ dinner he was very proud of packing? Was celery sticks and Jell-O cups.Which we ate while he told me what I should be changing about my diet and lifestyle to be more attractive to the men who have to spend time with me.”
“What a dick.” Marcus makes a face of disgust and shakes his head. “I’m seriously hoping you shoved a celery stick somewhere extremely uncomfortable in his bodily orifices.” He chuckles. “I’m saying this as a private citizen and this in no way represents the view of the Federal Bureau of Investigation.” He adds on, dry humor lacing his tone.
You shrug, being far past any kind of upset about it, and gently and briefly run your knuckle along the side of his hand in a soothing gesture. “I went home and ordered a pizza for me and my roommate to have with some beers while we watched the actual game that was on that night. Much better use of my time.”
“Perfect.” Marcus nods in approval. “If he wanted to really make it a date, he should have taken you to the game. Cheap seats, hotdogs, and beer?” He gives a small groan of approval. “Nachos and the ice cream that comes in the little hats.”
“I’m seeing a road trip to a Rangers game in our future.” The prediction makes your smile widen, and don’t for one moment regret letting yourself get excited.
“We could do that.” Marcus has to admit that he wouldn’t mind that at all. “We didn’t have a professional team in Portland, but we had a minor league team that I would go to sometimes.”
“Are you from Portland originally?” You ask, wanting to know more about the man you already feel so comfortable with.
“No.” He shakes his head and shrugs. “I’m from southern Cali, don’t hold it against me. Portland was my first duty station out of the Academy.” He gives a small chuckle. “San Diego to Quantico was like a completely different world.”
“Man, I thought upstate New York to DC was bad.” Shaking your head a little, you try to imagine a laid back, potentially surfer-sequence version of Marcus getting used to the pounding pace of the nation’s capital.
“Completely. I had just finished school and it was a completely different universe.” He chuckles, looking over at you with a grin. “Frat parties to weapons training.”
“I went from the family farm to the big city.” The image of him as a frat boy is endlessly entertaining to you, because he doesn’t give off that stereotypical energy in the least. “8 am classes were nothing compared to getting up before dawn to milk the cows before school, let me tell you.”
“Wow.” He tosses you a grin. “No wonder you spent ten minutes telling me about how different cheeses reacted to different styles of graters.”
“You can take the girl out of the dairy farm, but you can’t take the obsessive knowledge of all things milk-related out of the girl.” At the time you had barely noticed you were doing it, but now you can feel the tips of your ears heat up. “When were you at Quantico?” You ask, quickly changing the subject.
“Ten years ago.” He smirks slightly at your obvious embarrassment, but he had been fascinated by the mini lecture.
As he pulls up to another red light, you turn fully toward him in your seat with your eyebrows furrowed as seriously as eyebrows can possibly be furrowed. “Marcus.” You shake your head at him, barely keeping yourself from laughing. “I graduated from George Washington University eight years ago. This…” You can’t hold them back, the giggles escaping at the ridiculousness of the whole thing. “This isn’t the first time we’ve lived in the same city…”
“Jesus.” His own giggles burst out until the two of you are laughing in his car like idiots.
“The universe literally just shoved you through my front door today. Just incredibly sick of us walking past each other on the street.” You may not put a lot of stock in destiny or the universe, but it sort of seems like the something out there is dead set in making you believe.
“No, what will be sick is if you used to go to the Command Post.” He tells you, remembering heading to that little sports bar when they needed a break to have a few beers and shoot some pool. It’s one of the few places he had gone.
“Um…” Sinking back into your seat, you cringe a little before you burst out giggling again. “My roommate…Naomi…s-she used to bartend there…”
His eyes blow wide, and he whips his head around to stare at you in shock. “No shit?!” He huffs out. “Jesus, Madison was fucking in love with her. Swear he would tip her like forty bucks every time he bought a round.” He pauses. “Curly hair, skin the color of dark chocolate and would wear green contacts?”
“You know Madi?!” It’s a goddamn blessing that you’re nearly at the movie theater, because you’re both about to bust out of the car from laughing so hard. “Oh, you’re going to fucking love this.” What the ever-fucking-fuck kind of coincidence is all this? “Marcus, they’re dating now! He’s here in Texas. They ran into each other a couple of months ago at a private party she was working.”
“Jesus, I wondered where the hell he went.” Madison had gotten caught up in a bad bust in organized crime and had left the FBI. He slaps his hand against the steering wheel and starts laughing again. “Okay! I get it! We were supposed to meet!” He glances up at the roof of the car before he looks back over at you. “This is proof that the world is a small fucking place.”
“Fucking crazy.” You shake your head at him, aware your mouth is hanging open in disbelief but not really able to close it or stop being shocked. “When we hit that Rangers game, all four of us should go,” you offer, wanting to give him a chance to see his old friend again. “If you want.”
“Hell yeah.” Marcus chuckles and turns into the parking lot of the theater. “We used to talk about taking a train into New York for a Yankees or Mets game when we were studying our asses off.”
“You couldn’t just go to a Nationals game like everyone else in the city?” It’s so wild to think about that you’re not sure you’ll be able to start processing it properly any time soon. “I can’t believethis…”
“We did, but we wanted to go see a subway series game.” He tells you with a laugh.
“Just think,” you flash Marcus a grin and shake your head. “If we’d run into each other at the bar back then, maybe I could have avoided the Little League date.” You shrug. “But then, I do love to tell that story.”
He snorts and shakes his head. “It could have been possible. I met my ex-wife in that bar.”
“Oh yeah?” You haven’t poked or asked anything about her, but this feels like a moment to at least make the situation a little lighter. “Anyone I know?” At this point, you would believe anything.
“Okay, so if you knew Amanda Perez, I’m going to just declare this the Twilight Zone.” He huffs, glancing over at you to see your reaction to her name after he parks.
“That depends.” You can feel all the blood drain from your face, thinking about the only Amanda Perez you ever knew - ten years ago, in Washington DC. If it’s the same woman, you’re going to declare this completely insane. “Are we talking 5’9”, black hair, perpetually bronze skin, never drinks hot chocolate with mini marshmallows, and talks in her sleep when she’s stressed out?”
“Nofucking way.” Marcus leans back and gives you a wide-eyed stare of disbelief. “This is— how did you know her?” He chokes out.
“We…” You choke on it, honestly a little worried about how he’ll react. If you’re right about the timing…well, the universe has a very fucked up sense of humour. “We dated.” Your head drops, looking at your thumbs in your lap. “For about six months. Then she sat me down on campus one day and told me she’d met somebody else.” Just - apparently - like she’d done to Marcus ten months ago. “When did you guys meet?”
He feels like he’s been hit by a truck. Especially since he had specifically asked his ex-wife if she was dating someone when they met and he got her number. Woodenly, he tells you the date, something that he had memorized at one time as the luckiest fucking date in history.
“Cool.” You’re already nodding as soon as the month comes out of his mouth, and for the first time this memory makes your heart hurt not because she hurt you but because she hurt him just the same way. “Cool…yeah…we…um…we overlapped for about a month, then. She was seeing both of us for about a month…”
“I’m sorry.” Marcus is immediately apologizing, feeling completely sick to his stomach. “Fuck, I’m so sorry. I - I asked if she was seeing someone, I swear.”
“Marcus, I’m not mad.” Shaking your head again, it’s like you’re trying to shake your thoughts back into line. “I mean, I was. I was completely heartbroken. But it’s not your fault. She…” You shrug helplessly. “Clearly, she has a pattern of finding someone new before she leaves the person she’s with. I’m sorry…if this is all too weird, or too much, or upsetting for you I totally get it. I can take an Uber home and we can just wave awkwardly at each other in passing like most neighbors.” It would - you realize with a sick feeling dropping through you - be a little heartbreaking all over again. But you don’t want to put Marcus through any kind of pain.
“Why would I want that?” He frowns at you in confusion. “I mean…if you don’t think that it’s a good idea to date, I understand. But my ex-wife being a slightly shittier person than I had realized doesn’t change my interest in you.”
“Are you kidding?” A huff pushes its way out of you as you laugh in disbelief. “I want to send her a picture of us together. Ten years later and I still want to throw it back in her face. I may be feeling a little petty about it, to be honest. But I’m sure as hell not going to let the fact that we share an ex put me off wanting to be on this date with you tonight.”
The grin Marcus gives you is positively wicked, and he purses his lips slightly. “We are still friends on social media.” He tells you slyly. “We agreed that we would be 'friends’ because she couldn’t bear the thought of not knowing that I was okay.” He rolls his eyes slightly now that he knows that it’s a pattern his ex had for cheating. Something he had clearly stated he despised.
“Ooooo,” you rub your hands together with happy, petty glee. “Picture in front of the movie theater? See if she spontaneously combusts over Facebook?”
“Oh, I say we tease her.” Marcus huffs. “Post a picture of us holding hands and then one after the movie. Don’t you remember how nosy she is?” Amanda had always wanted to know what was going on in everyone’s lives.
“I will bet you anything that she will try to take preemptive credit about how she always knew we would get along or some bullshit.” With the specter of your mutual ex not hanging between you like an awful Twilight Zone episode, you lean quickly over the center console of his car and leave a small press of your lips on his cheek. “Come on, handsome, quick picture and let’s get some popcorn. Movie starts in less than five minutes.”
Marcus snorts as he gets out of the car, walking around it while giggling to himself like a schoolboy and gives you a smirk when he opens the door for you. “So, I have a technical question?” He started in a long draw. “Does…does our body count go up when we sleep together? Since we’ve slept with the same woman? Don’t we get a pass on this? I feel like we should get a pass.”
“Honey, I have a feeling my body count is a lot higher than yours anyway,” you throw him a playfully suggestive wink, but the fact is that you never actually made it to the altar over the last ten years and he did. “If you want a pass, it can be a pass.”
“That doesn’t scare me.” He shuts the door behind you and his hand rests on your lower back, not too low to be disrespectful but he knew you wouldn’t mind the touch. “Just like the fact that you used to date my ex-wife doesn’t scare me. We can bitch about her annoying traits together.” He jokes lightly.
“Blanket hog.” You groan immediately, making no effort to pretend you’re not leaning into his warmth a little. March in the evening in Texas still had a decided chill in the air. “I’ll offer this up on the Altar of Exes while we’re still on the topic, but I was engaged about a year ago. Part of packing up and coming to Texas was getting the hell out of New York again. It’s not necessarily a long story, but it definitely reads like the screenplay for a Hallmark movie.”
“Man or woman?” He asks curiously. It’s obvious that you have lived that never say never life and he’s interested in your background. “Not that it matters, heart break is heart break and I know it sucks.”
“Boy.” You roll your eyes dramatically. “Basically, I stayed in DC after college, trying to figure out what the hell to do with my hospitality degree that would pay more than minimum wage and no clear dream job. About four years ago, my mom got cancer, and my dad couldn’t take care of her and the farm on his own, so I moved back. Crate & Barrel let me transfer to the nearest store to my hometown and I kept my job there one day a week just so I wouldn’t have to quit. Turned out that my dad’s prized farm manager was my high school sweetheart. He and I got back together, tried to make it work, then when it was clear that my mom wasn’t going to make it, he proposed in front of her. Forced me to say yes, basically. A few months later I laid my mom to rest, told him to eat shit, and I found a promotion to move to.”
“Oh fuck.” He grimaces at the poor taste of that timing. “I could see if it was her wish to see her little girl happy or whatever, but nooooo.” He shakes his head and rubs your back in a half turn of his wrist. “I’m sorry about your mother, beautiful.” He murmurs softly. “That was the time to stand beside you and support you, but never push any type of big, emotional decision.”
“She would have liked you.” You tell him quietly, masking the slight sniffle that always threatens to invade when your mom comes up in conversation. “She did this weird thing…every morning she’d put the coffee pot on and go out to the garden while it brewed. I don’t know how she always had enough flowers every single day for a new vase, but there were always fresh flowers on the kitchen table when I came down for breakfast. So, the fact that you showed up at my door with flowers would have put you in her good books immediately.”
“Then I’m extra glad that I brought them.” Marcus tells you, walking up to the ticket booth and pausing the conversation long enough to purchase two tickets to the movie from the teenage girl behind the glass. Once he has them in hand, he turns to you and offers you the ticket he had gotten for you. “Maybe one day I’ll get to meet her and bring her the most beautiful flowers I can find.” He is obviously talking about visiting her grave with you, but it’s pretty clear that your mother meant the world to you.
“Sorry.” Sniffling slightly, you shake off the layer of melancholy and accept the ticket from his hand. “Didn’t mean to bring the mood so far down. I just don’t want you to think I’m commitment phobic or something. I didn’t make it down the aisle for a very good reason.”
“Baby.” It’s almost natural that the term of endearment comes from his mouth, especially at thismoment. “You have nothing to apologize for.” He assures you, reaching for your hand and lacing his fingers with yours, and giving them a small squeeze. “Good, bad, sad, I want to know all about you.” He leans in and kisses the side of your head. “Would a buttered popcorn, some Milk Duds and a large Coke help lift your spirits?”
The softness that rolls through you - the sweet little pet name, the touch of his hand, his lips, everything together - has you leaning against him all over again. Face to face, this time, and it means you can smile up at him and find out the exact shade of brown his eyes are when they’re all soft around the edges like they are now. “Make it Junior Mints, and you’ve got yourself a deal.”
“Done.” He’ll let you eat all of those, mint and chocolate never mixed with him, but he would buy two boxes for the smile on your face. “A large popcorn, a box of Junior Mints and two Cokes.” He orders when you reach the concession stand before he turns to you. “Anything else you want, baby?”
“That’s more than enough.” You promise him, both because it’s absolutely true and also because you’re not about to pout and request cuddles in front of the teenage cinema employee currently bored by your entire existence.
He gives you a smile before turning back to them with a smile. “That’s it.” He pays and hands you one of the Cokes and the Junior Mints while he takes the tub of popcorn and his own coke before leading you over to the butter station. “A lot of butter or a little?”
“I am routinely yelled at for drowning my popcorn,” you tell him seriously. “So put as much on as you want.”
He catches his tongue between his teeth and grins at you. “Are you sure I wasn’t supposed to meet you at that bar?” He asks, knowing that he would have approached you just as easily as he had Amanda and apparently you were a better fit. “We are going to need napkins.”
Reaching past him, you grab an exaggerated stack of napkins and tuck them in your hand along with the candy box. “I think we definitely were supposed to meet in that bar.” Once the facts of the situation had started to sink in - and the conversation since then - you’re willing to admit that there is an element of destiny or fate of some kind at play. There are just too many coincidences surrounding the whole thing.
Marcus cackles gleefully as the butter dispenser spurts again and again all over the kernels. “Remember how Amanda hated this?” He asks, shaking his head. “Always wanted plainpopcorn.”
“Lecture upon lecture about cholesterol.” Seeing even a little of Marcus’s catharsis through being able to vent about her is somewhere on the fence between kind of cute and wildly entertaining, and you love this level of freedom on him. “What is life without a little fun? A movie without buttered popcorn? Nachos without ungodly amounts of cheese and pickled jalapeños?”
Marcusmoans, rolling his eyes in pleasure. “Fuck yes.” He snickers. “We had one of those chocolate fondue fountain things? I definitely put that amazingly nasty canned nacho cheese in it during game day parties. Just hold the chip under the cheese.”
“Marcus Pike.” You deadpan his name, so he looks at you curiously. “That may be the sexiest thing anyone has ever said to me.”
“It’s official.” He shakes his head, and his face is splitting in two from the force of his grin. “You’re my soulmate.”
“Come on.” Your cheek heat deeply until your face is practically on fire, and you can feel yourself go shy at the honesty in his only slight tease. “Let’s go find a seat and take an astonishingly cute picture before the lights go down.”
“Perfect.” Marcus follows you into the theater and tells you to pick wherever you want to sit, secretly happy when you want the next to back row.
“Get the popcorn in the picture,” you snicker, wiggling around in the tight movie theater seats as the two of you try to find a decent way to pose for this silly photo.
He loves the way you think. Stretching his arm out so he can snap the pic. It takes a couple of tries, but eventually there is one really great one. “There it is.”
“We’ll see if she has anything to say about that in a couple of hours.” You’re absolutely certain beyond a doubt that Amanda’s need to be in the middle of gossip will prevail, and Marcus will probably have a few texts and you’ll have a friend request by the time the movie is over.
“You are evil, and I love it.” Marcus tells you as he captions the picture and posts it on his timeline before he turns off the phone completely.
“We dealt with enough of her bullshit, she can handle a little fun from us.” When you settle back into your seat, you have no desire to do any of the vaguely uncertain mincing around and instead just lean into his side. You want to be beside him, and you won’t apologize for it.
Marcus lifts his arm and puts it around your shoulder. Never happier than this moment in how candid the two of you had been with each other. “Popcorn?” He asks as the lights dim.
“Well, we didn’t just get it for the picture.” With a grin, you grab a few kernels off the top of the tub and offer them to him, fully aware of the intimacy of the gesture.
There is a moment where he just looks at you, amazed at how easy all of this is with you before he leans forward and opens his mouth for you to feed him the popcorn, closing his mouth around your fingers and making sure to suck the buttery richness off of the tips before he pulls his head back.
Alright. Well. There’s no way you’re going to be able to concentrate on the movie now and you absolutely brought that upon yourself. Hoping Marcus didn’t register too much of the flash of heat in your eyes, you ease yourself back into your seat and under his arm as the credits begin to roll.
The movie starts, but all Marcus can think about is you. Every time you shift slightly, it’s to bring yourself closer to him and he can’t say that he hates it. The movie plays, almost in the background he’s so hyper aware of you and every time you reach for the popcorn, his own hand bumps yours as you both seemingly have the same sense of timing. “I’m starting to think you’re doing it on purpose.” He teases, leaning in to murmur softly in your ear.
“Me?” You whisper, batting innocent eyelashes at him. “I am innocent and pure and am not at all enjoying the small touches.” Just pointing it out tells him how much you are enjoying them, and hopefully lets him know how borderline giddy you are.
“God, I hope not.” Marcus whispers back playfully and leaning in a bit more so that his nose is almost touching yours. “I have a firm rule of never kissing someone innocent and pure on the first date and I was really looking forward to that first kiss I am planning.”
“Oo, there’s a plan?” You raise an eyebrow at him, grateful there’s no one sitting nearby to shush your whispered flirting. “So, I’d better not close the gap and do it myself right now, huh?” You wouldn’t, not if he’s been thinking about it enough to have an actual idea of how it will happen. But it’s fun to tease.
“I mean…you are always welcome to close the gap and do it now.” Marcus hums. “But I was honestly thinking that it would be even better if it were when we were both full and there was the taste of sweet wine on your lips, maybe the light of the moon shining down on your face. Where I can face you completely and cup your cheek. Slow to start, testing the waters before it deepens.”
Swallowing the hard thump of your heartbeat, you can feel the excitement course through your veins. The promise of something new, and potentially big, hovers in the horizon and in his words. “But,” your voice is barely above a breath. “How will we know which is better unless we’ve tried both?”
“Clever girl.” His eyes are soft and yearning, flickering down to your lips for a moment before looking back up at your own soft orbs. He tilts his head slightly in invitation, offering you his lips but not demanding anything. This next step was yours to take if you want to.
The world seems to slow, in that beautiful way it only does when something wonderful is about to happen, and the faded dialogue of the movie filling in the background like Marcus is your own personal screen idol. It takes only a small turn off your head to nudge his nose with your own, eyes flicking up to find his lids heavy and hazy as you lean forward imperceptibly to press your lips to his.
There is something sweet and yet so incredibly titillating about the buttery, salty taste of your lips. He sighs slightly and his lashes flutter as he closes his eyes and leans in more firmly into the kiss.
It’s adolescent, to be sharing your first kiss in the back of a movie theater over a tub of buttery popcorn and sticky-sweet soda, and you sort of love that about it. The moment is relaxed and unpretentious, with the hum of excitement running all through it as Marcus presses back against your soft approach and you happily sigh to deepen the first moment of physical intimacy between you. He forgets that you are in public, forgets that there is a movie playing on the screen in front of you. Everything but the feel of your lips on his fades away into the background.
With the way he molds so perfectly against you, it would be so easy to go too far. To just toss up your hands and indulge, the rest of the world be damned. But you remind yourself that it’s early days. Just the beginning. And there can be so much more if this to come.
You pull back gently, reluctantly, and feel yourself mourn the loss of his touch immediately as you’re nearly panting for the breath he’s stolen from you. “I…um…wow…”
“Wow, is right.” Marcus gives you an almost goofy grin.
“The moonlight and sweet wine have a lot to live up to, later.” You tell him with a sly smirk, before settling into his side again. Teasing Marcus is easy and fun - comfortable as well as exciting. Something you hope you’ll never get used to. Teasing him and kissing him are very similar endeavors.
“I will have to bring my A game to top that kiss, but I think I can.” His fingers brush the skin of your arm gently, making you shiver. He hums, knowing that it’s not cold that makes you react like that, but he uses it as an excuse to lean close again. “Let me know if you need my jacket, beautiful.”
“Just you, handsome.” You both know it’s not the chill of the air conditioning making goosebumps raise on your skin, and you offer him another piece of popcorn from your fingers. “Just you.”
He smirks and takes the popcorn again, this time making sure to twirl his tongue around your fingers as if your digits were your clit and he was treating it to his singular attention.
“Tease,” you murmur under your breath, acting like you’re upset about it but you’re honestly not in the least. Turned on, however? Oh yes.
“Not teasing.” Marcus responds smoothly. “Promising.”
You’re proud of yourself for not whimpering, but there’s no way he misses the way you shift in your seat and gently squeeze your thighs together in anticipation. Your ex-fiancé wasn’t a bad lover or anything, but oral just wasn’t his time to shine. Cumming on Marcus’s tongue sounds like heaven. “I hope you keep your promises, then.” Not that you doubt him. Of anyone in the world, you fully believe Marcus Pike keeps every promise he makes.
“It might be my favorite thing in the world.” He lifts a brow at you and smirks slightly. “And it’s been a long time since I’ve gotten to indulge.”
“Fuck…” That’s definitely a whimper, and you’re grateful no one is nearby to judge you for it. “Well, I’m happy to break that dry spell for you.”
“We just have to survive this movie and dinner.” He murmurs softly. “I’d already taken tomorrow off. Do you have to work?”
“No.” You’re all but shaking your head, ready to promise him you can sleep in and stay naked if that’s what he wants. All he has to do is say the word. Tipping your head back, you find his soft eyes watching you. “And Naomi’s staying with Madison tonight. So no roommate, either.”
“Hmmmm.” He smiles and leans in. He doesn’t kiss you, but he does nuzzle your nose with his. “So I don’t have to worry about you being too loud then.”
“With what they put me through, they deserve payback.” You grumble softly, breath catching at the unexpectedly dirty reply.
“I’ve heard.” He snorts. “Our bedroom walls are shared. “Once I get my bed, we might have to have a competition.”
“We can trash my second-hand bed with a contest, not your brand new one.” You know what that big, beautiful four poster is costing him, and you won’t let him waste that kind of investment.
He huffs and sends you a cocky smirk. “I have to test out how durable it is.” He teases, body extremely interested in this conversation.
The slickness between your legs is nearly fogging your brain with your nod and murmur: “For science.”
“For science.” He agrees and tries to look back at the screen with a sigh. “So…I have a naughty idea.” He poses. “What if we leave the movie now and go get dinner.” He knows he hadn’t watched any of the movie up on the screen if he was honest with himself. Too focused on you.
Flicking your eyes back up to the screen, you have to admit that if you hadn’t seen it a dozen times already, you would have no idea what was going on - finding him much more engrossing than Norma Desmond could ever hope to be. “Very naughty.” You agree with a grin. “Let’s go.”
The two of you giggle as you make your way down the stairs and out of the theater. Marcus only feels slightly bad about tossing a nearly full drink and popcorn, but he’s too interested in getting you alone where you don’t have to worry about bothering others with your conversation. “Note to self, watch movies at home. When I get a TV.”
“Ah, electronics. The one thing I am absolutely useless in shopping for.” Now that you’re out in the lobby, your voice almost feels odd at full volume again. “But yes, you do need a tv.”
“I am an excellent judge on TVs.” Marcus tells you snootily. “If I can turn it on and watch TV, it’s good.”
“Well, I can’t fault your logic.” You shake your head at him as you make your way through the lobby. “But you’ve forgotten. In order to be good, a TV must also be verybig.”
He snorts and throws you a mildly dirty look as you exit the theater and make your way into the dusky night. The sun is starting to set and he chuckles. “How about a good mid-sized tv that knows how to work really well?” He bargains, aware that he’s not talking about TVs at all.
“Oh, we’re talking about TVs.” Throwing him an exaggerated wink, you nod wisely. “Yeah, function over form, every time.”
His hand on your back flexes slightly, resisting the urge to reach down and pinch your ass. If this wasn’t your first date, he might actually do it, but he needs to somewhat mind his manners. “So where would you like to eat dinner, beautiful?” He asks you softly, wondering if you have any favorite places or anywhere you’ve wanted to try.
“I’m not picky.” The stroll back out to the parking lot is lazy and the warmth of his hand on your back lulls you against his side yet again. “You mentioned steak earlier. We’ve talked about barbecue. There’s a good Italian place I know. Anything it’s fine.”
“Ehhhhh.” Marcus would prefer that you pick but he knows that it might just lead to a longer conversation about the merits of each place and he doesn’t want to take longer than he has to in order to get you sat down to wine and dine. “How about Chama Gaucha?” He asks, wondering if you would like the Brazilian steakhouse. “They even have a salad bar.” He offers enticingly.
“This is going to be a thing, isn’t it?” You wrinkle your nose at him, sticking out your tongue for good effect. “Brazilian barbecue it is.”
“I’mcompromising.” He sticks his tongue out at you. “I heard that is healthy in relationships.”
“Funny how often we used to get those lectures when we were always the ones bending over backwards.” With another heavy eye roll, you take the last few steps to his car a little faster - his long legs meaning he’s already beaten you there. “It’s a meat and veggies compromise, but from how much you obsessed over picking out wine glasses, I’m guessing they have a killer wine list.”
“I have heard they do.” Marcus had never been there himself, but it was one of the restaurants that he had been wanting to try. He just hadn’t yet because it’s not any fun going to a place like that by yourself. “Hopefully we will find out.”
“Hopefully we will.”
As always, Marcus holds your door for you to get in and settle in before he shuts it and climbs into the driver’s side.He starts the car and pulls out of the theater parking lot so he can navigate towards the restaurant. He has always had a pretty good sense of direction and exploring the city for work had helped him get a good idea of the overall layout and where a lot of things were located. “What type of wine do you like?”
“Do I lose points if I say ‘cheap’?” You offer him what you hope is a charming smile. “I’ve matured only slightly beyond my college Arbor Mist obsession. So…I guess that’s anything sweet and fruity.”
He raises a brow at that. Amanda had been very picky about wine, and they had spent several vacations in Napa Valley as a result. “I’m guessing a shiraz might be the best starting point.”
“I know, I have the palate of an 18-year-old sometimes. It’s awful.” You shake your head in defeat.
“No, I’m just wondering how you and Amanda got on with that.” He chuckles. “She is…rather snooty about wine.”
The huff that pushes out of you is audible. “I pretended really hard.” You tell him quietly. “But…I don’t want to pretend with you.”
“Does it help that I like beer better than wine?” He asks, sending you a side glance. “And a good tequila is the best.”
“You’ll show me what you like, and I’ll show you what I like.” That’s how it should work. At least to you. No pretending and no lying. If it goes beyond tonight, anyway. “If you want to, I mean.”
“Oh, I’m just thinking about how to stock my fridge when you come over to my place.” He throws you a smirk. “If you want Arbor Mist, I’ll make sure that you have whatever flavor is your favorite. If you like IPAs…” He grimaces. “You’re on your own there.” He teases and wrinkles his nose playfully.
“These days it’s more like shandies and Riesling.” You relax measurably in your seat, that unhappy flash of nerves fading away. In its place, you send him a smirk. “You never did tell me your favorite cheeses.”
He tosses you a mildly guilty grin. “Is this date over if I tell you that it’s goat cheese?” He snickers.
You half-snort, covering your giggle with one hand. “It would be off if you were dating my father.”
“Well then I guess it’s a good thing that my favorite cheese is Havarti.” He chuckles and can’t help but reach over and take your hand. “That or fresh mozzarella.”
His fingers laced through yours are warm and weighty, and you raise the back of his hand to your lips to press a kiss to his skin. “You teach me about good wine, and I’ll teach you how to make fresh cheese,” you bargain, truly believing that the more you share, the better things will be.
“Ohhhh I like that.” Marcus grins. “How do you feel about charcuterie boards?” He asks seriously. He had gone with Amanda to a class on how to set up the best boards for parties and his ex-wife had been obsessed with them. As long as there was jalapeño jelly and berries on it, he was in heaven.
“Honestly that’s most of what I eat for lunch,” you admit without a hint of shame. “Just me and my little charcuterie board at my desk with a sweet tea? That’s heaven, baby.”
He hums in approval and nods. “So, I’m envisioning dates on my new couch with a charcuterie board and a new wine while we cuddle in our new blankets.”
“That sounds like the perfect rainy night.” The vision of a storm sounding outside the house while you curl up in a little blanket fort of your own making is about as sweet as he is. “Date night at home.”
“I’m glad you like that idea.” He gives you a sweet look as he stops at the red light. He’s only about six hundred feet away from the turn for the restaurant. “Your favorite version of a date is what?” He asks.
“Anything that involves learning.” It seems like a cop-out answer, you know that, but you squeeze his hand quickly and explain. “Teaching each other things, taking little classes, hitting a museum, or trying something that’s new to both of us.” You shrug slightly. “Nerd dates.”
“Damn.” Marcus hadn’t thought you could be any more perfect, but you continue to surprise him.
“Damn?” Your head quirks in his direction as he pulls into the restaurant’s parking lot.
“Just admiring how perfect you are.” He tells you as he parks and shuts the engine off.
“Oh,please,” you roll your eyes playfully.
“Seriously, you said the magic words.” He promises.
Willing to admit that might be the case, you reluctantly let his hand go so he can put his car in park. “Do you have the same answer, then?”
“I have to admit I might be asking you to accompany me to a few gallery showings.” He winks before he gets out so he can come around and let you out of the passenger side.
“Perfect.” You slip out of his car once more and happily accept his hand when it lingers by your side. “I can learn more about art.”
Inside the restaurant smells delicious and Marcus’ mouth waters. “Table for two please.” Marcus smiles at the host and squeezes your hand.
The genuinely bored looking host shows you to a booth where you are immediately greeted by your waitress with a smile and attitude as bright as the sun, and you fluster when she explicitly welcomes you out for what is clearly your date night. “How long y’all been together?” She asks, chattering away. “If ya don’t mind me askin’?”
Marcus looks over at you and then checks his watch. “Nine hours now?” He asks, looking over at you for confirmation. “At least that’s how long we’ve known each other.”
“Well, shoot.” The waitress laughs when both you and Marcus do, and easily excuses herself to grab Marcus a complete wine list when he asks for it.
“Nine hours strong.” You grin at him with flushed cheeks.
“I mean, I have to say that we are doing really well for nine hours.” He tells you. “We’ve found a mutual background and established our communication.”
“And you were the talk of the store after you left.” You tell him with a grin, knowing that it’s completely beside the point but still finding it fun.
“How so?” The waitress returns with the wine menu and Marcus quickly picks out one of his favorite sweet reds and looks towards you for the answer.
“Anyone redoing an entire house is always worth talking about.” You reason, taking a sip from the water glass in front of you. “Plus…I came back from lunch grinning like an idiot…”
“Grinning like an idiot, huh?” He asks, grinning like one himself right now. “Kind of like how I absolutely wasn’t dancing around my condo like an idiot while I unpacked all the shit I bought from this pretty sexy girl I met at the store?”
“Kind of exactly like that.” The image he presents with that is playful and dreamy, and your grin spreads wider. “I’m almost afraid to ask if you’re a good dancer.”
“Formal? I won’t step on your toes.” Marcus admits. “Amanda always said that for someone who could fuck I had zerorhythm.”
“Thank God.” You groan dramatically. “For a second I thought you were going to say you were a childhood ballroom champ or something. Considering you’re already pretty much perfect, that would have just been completely over the top.”
Marcus throws his head back and laughs, making the waitress grin as she comes up to the table again with the bottle to pour glasses for both of you. “Well at least you two are enjoying yourselves.” She says, sending you a wink.
“It’s refreshing to find out that he’s not textbook perfect, that’s all.” You shake your head at the waitress as if to tell her how ridiculous it is that he is so close to perfect, and listen with interest while she explains exactly how your very unique dinner will be served.
“That sounds incredible.” Marcus looks over to you and nods towards the buffet. “You want to go get your salad? I hear they also have an amazing lobster bisque.”
“There is nothing about this meal that doesn’t sound perfect.” And amusingly, it even hits on the ‘nerd’ qualification for a date, because you’ve learned an entire new genre of steakhouse operations.
He slides out of the booth and cheekily holds his hand out to you. “My lady, heaven on a buffet awaits. Shall we feast?”
You barely manage to cover your mouth, acutely aware that the couples at the surrounding tables won’t find your snort as endearing as Marcus does, and you reach to take his hand. “We shall,” you agree, mimicking his tone between giggles.
He helps you up and holds on to your waist while you both shuffle over to the buffet. Cheese slices, stuffed olives, pasta salads and everything to make a real salad are accompanied by the bisque, some rice and black beans with plantains that smells amazing, and the little cheese breads that you’ll later find out are amazing. Marcus groans at the plate piled high and grins at you. “This isn’t even the meat selection yet.” He reminds you.
“We’re going to pass out as soon as you park your car at home,” you predict, admitting to yourself that it would be fairly hilarious if it happened.
“Shit.” He huffs, shaking his head. “That just means that I’ve got to make up for it when we wake up.”
“Baby, a good date and a good sleep cuddled up together isn’t anything that needs to be made up for.” Of course, you’re fully and eagerly looking forward to having him in your bed, but you don’t want to give him the mistaken impression that it’s the only interest you have in him.
He flashes you a wink as both of you make your way back to the table. “So you don’t want to wake up with having your clit sucked on. Got it.”
“Oh, fuck off.” You hiss under your breath, with an absolute pout in your voice. “I’m just trying to behave! God, that thought is going to hauntme….”
His laugh is a little dark, a little mean, but he loves the way that you pout over the idea. Both of you sit back down and immediately a server comes over with steaks on a spit to ask if you would like some. Marcus nodes right away and holds out his other plate for the man.
Dinner is an elaborate, delicious, substantive dance, and you’re predictably stuffed by the end of it. The wine Marcus chose is far beyond your education level and a little extra tasty because of it, making you feel that much more spoiled. Halfway through your dinner you had both agreed that you would have to do this again, and that you would be tracking down a copycat recipe for the cheese bread to try making at home. You haven’t stopped laughing, teasing, or grinning like smitten teenagers all night. It is, in every way, an absolutely perfect night.
There’s a light breeze as he walks you to the car. Both of you are almost overly full, but it had been worth it. He looks over at you with a smile at the way you automatically turn your head and look at him. “I think that we can call this a success.” He comments lightly, swinging your hand that is encompassed in his.
“Without hesitation.” It’s past chilly and has officially become cold, and you tuck your free arm around yourself for a little extra warmth on the way to the car. “And I think we can both safely skip breakfast because we’ll still be full in the morning.”
Marcus doesn’t care that it’s only another hundred feet to the car. He slips his hand out of yours and starts shrugging off his leather jacket and stopping you so he can hold it out for you to put on. “Here.”
“I’m fine.” You protest, but it’s hollow and you both know it. The jacket is around your shoulders before you can even finish the thought and the warmth it retains from his body makes you shiver counterintuitively before you start to warm up. “I…thank you…serves me right for trying to be cute above all else.”
“Youare cute. And now I get to be a gentleman and give you my jacket so you aren’t cold when I kiss you.” He smirks and turns you towards the car again.
“Ohright,” you hum, as though you could ever forget exactly how amazing it had been to kiss him. “We still need to compare and contrast.”
He waits until he gets you to the car, the door right at your elbow when he turns to you and cups your cheek just like it said he would. There is an anticipation in this air, and he takes just a few seconds to absorb the sight of you looking at him. The shine of the moon on your face is perfect where he had parked away from the light posts and yet he could see the want in your eyes clearly. “Beautiful.” He whispers before he leans in and kisses you with far more assertion than he would have if that kiss in the movie theater hadn’t happened.
His version of a first kiss is definitely smoother. You’ll give him that. Smooth and deep and delicious - and not just because of the wine. One of your hands easily finds its way to his chest, feeling the way his heart beats out of control when you begin to kiss him back.
He softly encourages you to open up, tongue sliding along your lips before you open your mouth and let him inside. Marcus can’t help the groan that rises from his chest when his tongue touches against yours, almost shyly at first before moving with more confidence and determination as the kiss progresses.
Completely enveloped in the moment, a plane could have crashed in the restaurant parking lot, and you wouldn’t have noticed beyond thinking that the earth shaking under your feet was from how good and right kissing Marcus feels. His tongue slides against yours and his breathing stutters and his heart skips a beat in his chest. His hand curls around the nape of your neck and he tugs you just a fraction closer. It’s magical, the feeling of your lips against his and for a moment, he never wants this kiss to end.
The rest of the world may not exist, and would not have at all, except for a distant cat call from another part of the parking lot and you break from Marcus with an embarrassed giggle. Marcus chuckles and turns to give the person a wave before he turns back to you. “Home, beautiful?” He asks softly, reaching for the door handle to the car.
“Home.” The fingers you have twined in his shirt pull him back to you for another, shorter kiss before pulling away fully.
He hums and holds the door open for you, not closing it until you are completely inside before hurrying around the front so he can jump behind the wheel. Nerves and excitement are thrumming in his system but he’s not going to assume he’s being invited into your bed, not even after being told. You can always change your mind and he will respect that.
In the front seat of his car, wrapped up in his leather jacket, your lips twist into a smile when he climbs back in beside you. “I think we have to call it a tie,” you tell him sheepishly. “Since both kisses were definitely, wow.”
“Yes, they were.” Marcus agrees, turning the engine over and picking up your hand quickly to press a kiss to the back of it before letting it go so he can put the car into gear.
“I guess we’ll just have to collect more data. You know…experiment.” You squeeze his hand lightly in yours. “For science.”
He throws you a small smirk and nods. “For science.” He agrees before he decides to change the subject. “So, what do you normally do when you get off of work? Your wind down routine?”
“Depends on the day.” Hands still linked together, your fingers tangle easily in his and keep him close while your heart beats louder and faster. “If I had a day shift, I’ll bring a book out to the garden before I start thinking about making dinner. But if I worked a later shift then I’ll just figure out something fast for dinner and turn on the TV.” You chuckle awkwardly. “That makes me sound really boring. Maybe I am. But I live with my best friend so it’s not like I’m running out for drinks with her every night. We do that in the garden.”
“Then I guess I’m boring too.” Marcus assures you. “I’m too old to try and go out every night. Especially after a long day at work.”
“I would imagine that your days are a lot more demanding than mine.” Which is nothing against your job, just an acknowledgement of the fact that his job is higher stress.
“Sleeping in on days off is a particularly favorite hobby of mine.” He admits, knowing that those have been few and far between the last few months. “That’s why I wanted a good bed. I try to make it a rule not to get up except to pee until at least ten-thirty.”
“Sleep in and drip dry?” You guess, raising a scandalous eyebrow at him and flashing a grin.
“I know.” Marcus rolls his eyes playfully. “If I was an eccentric billionaire I would live on a private tropical island where I can sleep with the ocean breeze flowing over me and never wear clothes again. Just go for a swim and pad around nude.”
“Ohnoooo…” Laughing along with him, you won’t deny that you’re very interested to know exactly what that visual would look like. “Relaxation. That sounds just horrible. How will you eversurvive?”
a/n: you don’t need to have seen The Mentalist to read this fic (but I do recommend watching Pedro’s episodes, he’s SO perfect in this role)! All you need to know is that Marcus Pike is an FBI agent working for the Art Theft department. Scroll down to the end to “content” if you want to know specific smut content before reading :)
–
So far, the operation had been a bust; you had hoped to catch the reclusive money-laundering gallery owner at the fundraiser event tonight, but he hadn’t shown. After conceding defeat, you and Agent Pike slipped into one of the roped-off side rooms in the museum to discuss a way forward.
You felt incredibly uncomfortable in your attire for the night: a silky slip of a dress that showed far more skin than you were accustomed to showing. But this was a “trendy” look, supposedly, and you were masquerading as art critics at this stupid event. Your FBI-issued handgun was concealed in a hidden panel in your purse and you hatednot having it on your hip in your trusty uniform holster. You hated everything about this outfit. The fact that you had to youtube “how to apply an adhesive bra” just to wear this godforsaken dress tonight—
“You alright?” Pike asked, looking at you with a furrowed brow. You realized your face was scrunched up in a scowl, thinking about your goddamned flimsy bra, which had thankfully stayed on the whole night so far.
“Yeah,” you said, “just yearning for my uniform right now.”
“Tell me about it,” Pike said, gesturing to his outfit. “I’m wearing skinny jeans.”
It was decidedly not his style. You usually saw him in business casual or his FBI uniform. When you met on the weekends for coffee, he’d wear a leather jacket—and as far as you could tell, that was as adventurous as he got when it came to fashion. Skinny jeans? Not Marcus Pike, not in a million years. (But he did have nice legs, you had to admit.)
“So, our friend hasn’t shown,” you said, changing the subject to more pressing matters.
“I had a feeling,” Pike muttered. “Back to the drawing board, I guess.”
“Well, it was worth a shot,” you said with a sigh. “Let’s call it a night.”
Suddenly, Pike tensed, his face paling. You took a breath, about to ask him what was wrong, when he whispered harshly:
“Someone’s coming.”
You jumped when you heard it: footsteps sounding from the hallway where you came in. You whipped your head around, looking for another way out, but the only other exit was a door that read ‘EMERGENCY EXIT – ALARM WILL SOUND’.
Shit.
“I’m sorry about this,” Pike said in a rush, bracketing himself around you, effectively pinning you to the nearby wall, in between two paintings. “Just play along.”
“Sorry for wha—”
Then he kissed you.
Marcus Pike kissedyou.
You froze. What the fuck was he doing? How was this supposed to help? What was this—
Your train of thought was interrupted by his thigh wedging its way between your legs, sending a jolt of pleasure up your spine and making a filthy noise tumble from your throat, unbidden.
“Good,” he whispered, mouthing kisses along your neck. “Louder.”
You moaned again at his words, not really understanding why. Just play along, he had said. Whatever the hell that meant.
Suddenly, a booming voice rang out. “This section is CLOSED!”
Pike jumped away from you. You snapped to attention, head whipping around to see a familiar face: one of the lackeys of the corrupt museum owner stood some distance away, a blinding flashlight trained on you. You’d seen this man on surveillance footage in your briefing this week. He was the muscle. Usually the very armed muscle. Shit.
“S-sorry,” Pike said, his voice suddenly meek, that of a geeky art critic and not a federal agent. He raised a hand to scratch the back of his head, making a big fuss of the movement, while the other hand subtly reached behind him, hovering near where his gun was covertly tucked in the back of his belt. “My girlfriend and I—”
“Section’s closed!” He barked, gesturing with his flashlight. “Get a room.”
You felt your stomach drop back into place. He just thinks we’re horny artists. Thank god.
“Sorry, sir,” Pike said, taking you by the hand and making a swift exit.
–
You didn’t speak a word to each other as you scurried out of the gallery and into the side street where Pike had parked. He rummaged in his jacket pocket for his keyfob and frantically pressed at it until his car’s headlights flashed up ahead. Once you were inside, you put your head in your hands and let out a huge breath you didn’t know you were holding.
“Holyshit,” you rasped.
Pike didn’t respond, just methodically put on his seatbelt, started the car, and drove away. At the next red light, Pike reached over and buckled you in. You were so out of it that you had forgot.
“Thanks,” you said, voice a little more steady than it was previously.
“I’m sorry about what happened back there,” he said, eyes on the road.
“Uh, me too? I thought we were done for,” you said. You thought you were going to get shot, but you didn’t dare say it.
Pike shook his head. “I mean, I’m sorry I kissed you. It wasn’t right.”
“What are you apologizing for? You saved our asses.”
“By assaulting you? Yeah, great job I did,” he said.
You rolled your eyes. “Oh, for fuck’s sake, you didn’t assault me, Pike. It was… surprising, but I wasn’t upset.” Quite the opposite, actually.
Pike gripped the steering wheel a little too tightly—you could hear the fake leather squeak against his hands. “Nevertheless, I’m sorry.”
“Don’t be.” You sighed. “Seriously, I’m okay. Stop getting in your head.”
He didn’t seem totally convinced, but he didn’t protest any further. You sat in silence for the rest of the car ride.
–
“This is you,” Pike said when he turned onto your street, gesturing with his head towards your apartment building. It wasn’t much to look at, but it was in a considerably nicer neighborhood than your first DC apartment, that’s for sure.
“Indeed it is,” you confirmed.
Pike parked his car and turned off the ignition. He still looked like a kicked puppy—god, he wasn’t still worried about the kiss, was he?
Fuck it. You’d been working with the man for nearly two years now, and at this point, you considered him a good friend. You never felt judged when you confided in him. Why not just be honest?
“I liked it,” you said, oddly calm.
Pike’s face scrunched up. “Huh?”
“The kiss,” you said, and nowyour heartbeat was starting to ratchet up. “I liked it.”
His eyes widened. “Oh,” he said, voice soft.
“Yeah,” you replied. “You can… do it for real, if you want.”
Pike looked at you silently, his gaze flickering from your eyes to your mouth.
The adrenaline from earlier in the night must have been fueling your courage, because you soldiered on. “Do you want to come in?”
–
Pike followed you wordlessly to your apartment, the tension so heavy in the air you thought you might suffocate. With shaking fingers, you managed to unlock the door and flick on the lights.
As soon as the door closed behind Pike, he held you by the waist and kissed you soundly.
“You have no idea how long I’ve wanted to do that,” he said when he pulled away.
“We kissed like, an hour ago—”
“A real kiss,” he specified, bringing one hand to cup your cheek. He brushed his thumb along your lower lip like it was something precious. He kissed you again, just a soft press of lips, ever the gentleman. You thought about his thigh between your legs earlier that night and god, you wanted that again. You kissed him back, firm and insistent, curling your fingers in his hair.
When you gave his hair a gentle tug, his whole body seemed to shiver, and his kiss became more daring—his tongue in your mouth, his hands inching down, down, stopping just shy of your ass.
Suddenly, he pulled away from the kiss. “I should go,” he said—but the tone of his voice made you doubt that he wanted to leave.
“What’s the matter?” You asked.
“I’m moving too fast,” he said with a wistful smile.
“I’mthe one who invited you in, Pike,” you said.
“Fair point,” he said. He let his hand rest on your waist again, his fingers stroking the silky material of your dress. “It’s just—I haven’t done this in a while. Not with someone I… care about.”
Oh.You knew what this was about. Teresa, the woman he was with just before he moved to DC. They were supposed to get married, but she left him for another man. You didn’t know much beyond that, but he had told you enough—that he felt he moved too fast and scared her away.
“If you want to stop now, I get it,” you said. “But I’m here to tell you I’m not going anywhere. I’ve waited two years, I can wait some more.”
You didn’t realize the weight of your words until after they left your mouth. Shit. He wasn’t supposed to know you’d had doe-eyes for him since the day you joined the Art Theft squad. You looked down at the floor, anywhere but his face right now.
“Two years?” He asked softly.
“Yeah,” you whispered.
“But—what about that guy you dated from Quantico?”
“He was a nice distraction,” you said.
“Why didn’t you say anything?” He asked.
You didn’t respond for a moment. Slowly, you looked back up from the floor to his face. His features were kind and reassuring. You took a deep breath. “Well, I’m saying it now,” you said.
He smiled. “Let’s make up for lost time, then,” he said, snaking his arm around your waist and pulling you in for another kiss.
–
After kissing you breathless, you lead him by the hand to your bedroom. He went with you eagerly, and when you sat on the edge of your bed, he followed suit.
You pushed at the lapels of his tweed jacket, getting it off his arms and onto the floor. He reached behind you, searching for your dress zipper. He found it, grinning triumphantly for a moment before pulling the zipper down. The dress fell off your shoulders, revealing—
You laughed. “You’re asking me? I had to consult the internet just to put the damn thing on.”
“Howis it on?”
“Adhesive,” you said.
“Do you just… rip it off? Like a bandaid?” Pike said.
“I guess?” You replied, picking at it with your fingernail. A corner of it peeled off without much force. Damn, it was flimsy.
You peeled it off the rest of the way and chucked it across the room. “Good riddance.”
Pike laughed, his eyes crinkling at the corners. “Here I was thinking skinny jeans were a pain,” he said.
“To be fair, those do look a little tight,” you said.
“Theyare. My dick hurts.” He winced, reaching down to adjust himself. “Too much information?”
You rolled your eyes. “My tits are out, Marcus, I think you’re good.”
At the mention of them, Pike was suddenly gazing at your breasts—as if he hadn’t realized he was allowed to look. He tentatively reached out and cupped one, stroking at it gently with his thumb. You sighed, arching your back. He ran his hand from your breast to your arm, where the strap of your dress had fallen. He dragged the strap down, and with a little wiggling from you, managed to get your dress on the floor, leaving you only in your underwear.
“You have way too many clothes on,” you said, working at the buttons of his shirt. He nodded, helping you get it unbuttoned the rest of the way before shrugging it off. Pike then reached for his jeans, sighing in relief as he popped the button of his fly and dragged the zipper down.
“Thesefucking jeans,” he grumbled, wriggling his hips back and forth as he peeled the denim off his legs. When he finally got them off, they took his socks with them. He kicked the heap of clothing into the corner, landing somewhere near your dress and that flimsy piece of foam masquerading as a woman’s foundational garment.
Now it was yourturn to stare. From the plane of his chest, to his soft belly, to his straining hard-on in his gray boxer-briefs—he was beautiful, and you didn’t know what you wanted to touch first. The outline of his cock was the most tempting, though, and you slowly ran a hand up his thigh, stopping just short of where he was hard and aching.
“Please,” he said in a hushed tone, hitching his hips up just a little. You brushed your hand over his bulge, feather-light at first. Then you pressed a little more firmly, slowly dragging your palm against him. He groaned, hands gripping the bedcovers tightly.
Feeling bold, you got off the bed, kneeling in front of him. You tugged at the waistband of his boxers and he lifted his hips, letting you pull them down and off.
You delighted in the sight of his thick cock jutting up against his belly, the tip pink and glistening. God, you wanted him. You leaned forward and licked a hot stripe from root to tip, and the noise he made was so exquisite you could cry. Taking a light hold with your hand, you guided him into your mouth.
“Ah,fuck!” His hips jerked up off the bed, but you quickly held them down. You took him in as far as you could, and he moaned again—louder, more desperate. You found a rhythm, bobbing your head and hollowing your cheeks, your hand wrapped around what your mouth couldn’t reach. Pike offered a tentative hand to stroke your hair with reverence, his hips trembling with the effort not to move too roughly.
After a particularly sly maneuver with your tongue, Pike tensed and stilled your head with a gentle touch.
“If you don’t stop now,” he said between ragged breaths of air, “this’ll be over before it even starts.”
You pulled off of him slowly, wiping your mouth with the back of your hand. “Sorry,” you said, your voice light and teasing.
“Don’t be,” he replied. “Fuck, that was good.”
You couldn’t help but feel a burst of pride at the praise from him.
Pike patted the bed next to him. “Get up here so I can return the favor.”
You crawled up the bed, heart hammering and head dizzy with excitement. He motioned for you to lie back and you did so, taking a deep breath to try and still your racing pulse.
Pike propped himself up on his elbows and slowly kissed a path down your thigh. Your cunt throbbed in anticipation and you bucked your hips up, desperately seeking sensation. He smiled at your eagerness and held your hip down with one hand. With the other, he pushed the sodden gusset of your panties to the side and slowly slid a thick finger inside of you.
You let out a needy sound, clenching around him as he added a second finger. You were so wet that the movement of his fingers made loud, slick noises that were absolutely obscene.
Pike kissed your thigh again. “Gorgeous,” he murmured against your skin. He then pulled his fingers out of you and you whined at the loss.
“Need to get these off,” Pike explained, hooking his fingers into the elastic of your underwear and pulling them down and off.
Pike’s face was between your thighs, now, and you sobbed at the first touch of his tongue to your clit. He slid his fingers back inside your cunt and the jolt of pleasure was like a lightning strike.
“Please,” you begged, not sure what you were asking, but needing it all the same, “please.”
You moaned loudly as he lapped at you ever-so-slowly with the flat of his tongue in time to the rhythm of his fingers. His unoccupied hand moved from your hip to your hand, lacing your fingers together. You squeezed his hand tightly as you found yourself already dancing dangerously close to the edge.
You started to grind your cunt against his tongue, needing the pressure just so, and he eagerly let you use his mouth for your pleasure. He alternated between licking and sucking on your clit, and you were sofucking close that you could hardly stand it.
Pike pulled his mouth off you for a moment. You whined and tilted your hips up, trying to chase his tongue.
“Close?” He asked, keeping the rhythm of his fingers firm and steady inside of you.
You didn’t trust your mouth to form words, so you nodded vigorously. He got back to work, faster this time, relentless, and the heat in your belly coiled tighter and tighter until you were coming so hard you saw stars. Your thighs clamped like a vise around his head but he didn’t seem to care in the slightest, working you through your orgasm with his tongue and fingers.
You clenched around him through every aftershock. He pressed a final little kiss on your thigh before pulling his fingers out and wiping them on the sheets.
Gazing into his warm brown eyes, breathing with him in tandem, it took you a minute to realize something.
“Oh, fuck,” you said. “Condom.”
You wondered if you still had any in your bathroom cabinet from when you were still with your ex, but it had been a long time since you’d broken up. Shit.
Pike snapped to attention. “Yeah, um,” he started, hopping off the bed to retrieve his jacket, “think I have one in my wallet.”
He rummaged around in his jacket pocket, retrieving his wallet and rifling through it.
“Gotcha,” he proclaimed. He turned the foil packet around in his hands, looking for the expiration date. “And it’s still good.”
“Hallelujah,” you remarked, throwing your head back in relief. “Get over here.”
“Yes, ma’am,” Pike said, making his way back to you. He knelt on the bed as he ripped open the wrapper and rolled on the condom.
Settling between your legs, he took himself in hand and rubbed at your swollen cunt before easing himself inside. You gasped at the feeling of him fully seated inside you, the delicious stretch of it achingly perfect. After a moment, he ground his hips into yours, moving out barely an inch before rocking back in. You scratched at the expanse of his back and shoulders, hitching up your hips, urging him to move.
“You’re beautiful like this,” he whispered, fucking you slow and deep. You made keening little noises with every thrust, unable to help it. You felt so full.
Pike began to move faster, now, his kisses swallowing up your sobbing cries. The sweet ache in your belly was building up again, and the moment you thought you would tumble over the edge, he slowed his pace. You groaned in frustration, gyrating your hips, needing him to fuckyou, damnit, but it felt too fucking good to complain.
When Pike slipped out of you, though, you definitely wanted to complain. However, all that came out was a petulant huff. He just chuckled and urged you to lie on your side. Slotting behind you, he guided himself back inside of you before wrapping his arms around you, holding you close to his chest. The new angle was heavenand you writhed in his arms, feeling him absolutely everywhere.
He snaked a hand down to rub your clit while he fucked you, faster now. You cried out and grasped at his arms for something to ground you, something to keep you connected to reality, because this felt so fucking good it very well could have been a dream.
“I’m—P-Pike—Marcus, I’m gonna—” You found yourself babbling, barely coherent.
“I’ve got you,” he said, the low rumble of his voice warm in your ear as he worked at your swollen little clit. That was it; you were shaking apart, trembling as he fucked you through your orgasm. The muscles of your cunt fluttered around him, every nerve in your body on fire.
Pike’s movements were becoming more erratic. Every thrust was harder than the last, and he moved his hand to grasp at your hip as he rutted into you frantically. You squeezed down on his cock, wanting to push him over the edge.
“Fuck,fuck!” He lasted a few more desperate thrusts before he was coming, too, biting into the skin of your shoulder and holding you tightly to him.
You both stayed there for a while, breathing heavily, all fucked-out and blissful. You nestled closer into him and he hummed into your shoulder.
“Be right back,” Pike mumbled, holding himself at the base and easing his cock out of you. You sighed at the feeling of emptiness—part of you wished he could just stay there all night.
As you stretched out on your bed, he shuffled off into your bathroom. You heard the tap run for a moment before he returned, condom off—presumably in the trash—and a damp washcloth in hand.
The press of the cool washcloth felt good on your hot and throbbing cunt; he then wiped down your thighs, where an embarrassing amount of your slick had dribbled down.
“Thank you,” you murmured as you looked up at him. He kissed your cheek.
It was bugging you, and you couldn’t help but ask. “You tied the condom off and threw it out, right?”
Pike raised an eyebrow. “Yes?” He said. “What, did Quantico not tie them off first?”
“Worse,” you grumbled, “he flushedthem.”
Pike snorted. “That’s a new one on me.”
“Had to call a goddamn plumber,” you continued.
“Please tell me at least the sex was good.”
“It was awful,” you groaned. “You should have kissed me sooner.”
“Sorry,” he said. “I’ll make up for it.”
“You better, Agent Pike,” you teased before giving him a peck on the lips.
He was having none of that; he pulled you in for a proper kiss. “I will,” he said, “I promise.”
–
a/n: well, it turns out I’m eternally a sucker for the undercover-as-a-couple trope.
And in case you’re curious: Marcus Pike gets called Agent Pike way more often than he gets called Marcus in the show, so that’s what I went with here. And FYI, Quantico is the county in Virginia where the FBI training academy is. Just a fun little detail.
content:surprise kiss (“fakeout makeout”), oral sex (m and f), missionary, cuddle-fucking (spoon-fucking? side-fucking? whatever you’d like to call it lol)
